Seattle
by Atheniandream
Summary: Two Surprises. Two Cities. And two people desperately trying to hold onto what they hold most dear. Post 7.16 Multi-Fic. ***CHAPTER 5 NOW UP***
1. Chapter 1

_**Author's Notes:**_ _In light of tomorrows Premiere of what could be a very different show, I thought I would put a fic out. Been toying with this one for a while. Hope not to ruffle too many feathers! ;-) Expect some appearances from nearest and dearest._

 _. …._

 ** _Seattle_**

By Atheniandream

. . ..

 _ **Two surprises. Two Cities. And two people desperate to protect what they hold most dear...**_

. . …

Donna Paulsen is in a rather _precarious_ situation.

She's….got no other option, really.

Rachel is gone. Mike, too. It's 1am in the morning and, when the awkward opportunity of fate arises, and at the tender age of forty three, you actually lose your house keys,

 _The nearest possible option will do._

Breaking her door down is a no-no. It'll take literal hours to drive to her Mom in Cortland and snag her spare key - _however inviting the idea of taking it back sounds_ \- and she doesn't want a throw money at an expensive Hotel, mere miles away from her own locked apartment.

She used to have a key to this particular place, but now she doesn't. Not that it would help any. The idea of sneaking in at this late hour churns her gut like a cement mixer, playing on the emptiness, brought on from late night cocktails and very little food.

She straightens, rapping her knuckles on the door.

There's just one teeny _tiny_ problem with her idea.

Her destination, _is Harvey Specter's condo._

 _A place that she's never once slept in._

She bends her knees slightly, her dress swishing.

 _Maybe this_ _was_ _a bad idea…._

…

Harvey Specter wakes with a start, plunged into the kind of darkness that used to give him nightmares as a small child, that thick soupy blackness that pours itself around you like molasses and catches at your breath, squeezing you. He blinks, fumbling for his cellphone, a worn in frown pressing against his confused gaze. For a second, he wonders if he's dreamt such a thing, until a moment later, a second knock echoes, full and rich and lively, alerting him to the possibility of a night-caller.

 ** _The days of Mike Ross appearing at his door are long gone, now…_**

He frowns, racking his brain, trying to recount anything that he's missed. He's not arranged anything, particularly notable. And he doesn't do t _hat_ kind of thing, _pay for a woman to arrive at his door in the middle of the night._ It's not that he doesn't respect the profession or the tradition, but in truth he's never needed it before; women have always flocked to him. Sometimes he's been grateful, other times not so, but never ever lacking.

 _And he definitely didn't arrange anything...the women of his recent past know not to darken his door unannounced._

He manages to find the remote that triggers his blackout blinds to rise, the whir of mechanical duress in the background as he blind steps to the door. It's the height of summer, and he's been unable to sleep in the almost afternoon seeming sky. He first tried working late, to rouse tiredness, but that ended in one almighty crash, and after six days of working till eleven every night he thought it best to use what his lavish pay check had helped him to acquire.

" _Coming_ ," He calls harshly to the door, padding through the lounge, flicking on the light as he rubs at his face, tiredness dragging at his lips as they press against the growing need to yawn.

He pulls the door open, pulling it towards him. The blood pours into his face, his eyes widening fractionally at the sheer sight before him.

"... _Donna_ …." He mumbles, his mind turning over.

And _'Donna'_ she is, dressed head to toe in a figure hugging turquoise sequined wave-emblazoned black gown.

He swallows, snapping the feeling that flares up in his chest clean in two.

.. . ..

Donna heaves an immediate sigh as she watches the door open slowly on its hinges. She had nearly turned on her heel, the stress of not knowing where you'll end up that gives the kind of relief that his, nay _any_ familiar face can offer. Sure, she makes enough to have gotten a room nearby, but she's never been a fan of a stranger space. She would always rather spend time at a friends than a place where all manner of things could have happened.

The door opens to an odd image; Harvey, feathers softly ruffled, and hair sticking up at all places and a cloudy attention suddenly sewn poker straight as he regards her.

"Donna," She hears him mutter, frowning lavishly.

"Harvey…Hi," She placates, ignoring the way her own voice softens against his appearance. "I...lost my keys. And Rach _used to have a spare, but_ -"

"No problem," He says, stealing the words from under her, as he gestures into the apartment. "Come in," He gestures, his head tilting as he opens the door fully for her.

She sheds a small sigh of relief, gliding past the open door and down the long hallway.

"Thankyou. I'm sorry to... _impose_. I know it's late." She adds, a self consciousness in her tone, the confusion of such a concept turning almost opaque between them.

"Donna, it's...fine." He says, after shutting the door behind them.. She can almost plot the frankness in his tone, his eyes hanging under a tired expression.

"You haven't..." She pauses, her eyes searching the place with an awkward humour about them. "By any chance, got a _lady friend in_ here, have you?"

His mouth twists then, his eyes narrowing as he catches her drift. "Do you think I would have made it to the door, if I had?" He answers, rather smugly.

"Well, it might have been an emergency." She defends.

"And you locking yourself out of your own apartment, _ **isn't**_ an emergency?" He questions, a wholly genuine sense of confusion tainted intrigue mixing up his handsome features.

It's a direct assault on her, and not one she's entirely ready for, as she gawps at him, her head tilting to challenge his words. " _I'm just...checking_." She says, her voice bending into a self-consciousness that doesn't match the sight of her.

He smiles softly, seeming entertained with her, as his eyes gravitate to his bedroom, pausing for a split second before flicking his attention back to her.

"You want a drink?" He offers.

"Weren't you...catching up on some _beauty sleep_?" She asks, arching a perfectly shaped eyebrow.

"Yes." He pauses, his face deadpanned, with the faintest touch of sarcasm. "But _someone_ woke me up."

"Touche." She says, watching as he skirts the kitchen counter and reaches for the fridge.

"Hot or Cold?" He asks.

"Tea would be great." She welcomes, smiling with a settled kind of relief.

"... _Tea_ ," He nods once, slowly, pausing for a fraction of a second long enough to awaken her intuition.

"You asked." She shrugs, feeling his scrutiny all over her. "Do you even _make_...tea?" She asks, the challenge of such a concept carefully woven into her words.

He turns to her with a cat like reflex, his face sharpening at the edges. " _You want the tea, or not?_ " He says, a sense of grump in his voice, propped up by the flash of a look in his eyes.

She chuckles, bending to the sight of Harvey Reginald Specter, cup in hand, giving her a past-midnight tea-laden ultimatum.

"I would _**love**_ some Tea, Harvey." She lavishes. " _Thankyou_."

His lips twitch and twist into a reserved smirk as he flicks a switch on the metal contraption that rests on the counter, plucking another cup out of the cupboard to his right.

"So...what's the dress for?" He asks, coolly.

When his words flood into the room, she looks up to find him glance at her only once, vaguely in between the picking of tea bags and rummaging in the fridge for milk, a slight avoidance in his gaze after that.

She tucks the feeling that his carefulness evokes in her, as she straightens, the slightly swimmy feeling in her gut laying waste to such things as modesty and coyness.

"You _like it_ , huh?" She plants, all too innocently, feeling rather gutsy in her ten thousand dollar one of a kind haute couture gown.

His eyes snap to hers, frank and heavy and all Harvey. "Blind men might have to work around the sequins, but, _even then_..." He says, rather abstractly. "It's a dress for a purpose, that's for sure."

She smiles. "Is that your way of asking me if I was out on a _date_ tonight?"

There is a palpable tension to their personal conversations now. There are things out on the table, things that didn't used to be an issue, that now become an additional chip to play in their gamble-laden game of two people avoiding the obvious.

She can't see his expression, as he busies himself with the task at hand.

She supressess a huff. She hates these silences that he's started to invoke between them. Half questions, with a subtext that she can feel and taste but not touch or see. She's the inevitable blind man scouring the moon-like surface of his heart for the bleak signs of life.

"No Date." She divulges." Just...the Opera... _and Louis_." She explains, watching how his eyes flick to hers at the mere mention of their co-worker. "Rachel was meant to come with me, but due to her impromptu nuptials and sudden city hopping…" She adds, her voice trailing off as she watches him look back to the counter, the muscles on his back softening at the information that she knows to be adequately disarming.

"So, you didn't go to Louis's, huh?" He asks pointedly, a smirk forming.

"Do you _want_ me to go to Louis's?" She offers, the threat of the possibility catching him hook, line and sinker.

The look he gives her in reply is all she needs.

She smiles to herself, looking about the apartment.

Donna has a piece of information. A piece, that for the past month or two, she's been holding like a winning card against her chest.

A while back, she screwed up. She told a lie, that somehow stuck. And since then it's been playing her for all she has, fixing her against the point, just as Harvey has begun to change.

He's... _softening_ with her. Opening up to her. As if he has no more cards to lay down for her, even as the game is still playing. Now he's in it for different odds. For a different prize entirely, and all whilst she's now fixed with a hand that she knows won't get her anything, unless of course she's willing to go all in and risk every little thing that they have ever built between them.

"I should...have a key." He says, his voice swimming into their small silence.

"What?" She frowns, her lips quirking with interest at his words.

" _To your place_? I should...have a key." He shrugs matter of factly.

She blinks. It's not the kind of thing that she thought he'd ever say. She's not entirely sure how to take it.

Harvey pauses, feeling her silence as he hands her a hot cup. "You have a key to my place, after all," He shrugs. "And...now that Rach isn't in the city _I just figure_ …"

She can see the wheels in his mind turning, that little spiral of doubt setting in…

"No, you're right," She says in a rush. "I've always had a key to yours. It... _makes sense_." She nods. "You know that I don't have that key anymore though, right?" She offers, raising the steaming cup to her lips.

"Yeah...I've been meaning to give it back to you." He admits, his eyes flicking to his own cup.

"Really?" She offers, blowing on her Tea.

"Yeah. It's always been yours, Donna." He tells her. "Truth be told, I should have never let you give it back to me in the first place."

He copies her gesture then, bringing the cup to his lips with a restrained smile as his lips squeeze into an 'o' shape, blowing slowly on the steaming liquid.

She finds herself getting lost in the sight of him, barefoot and grey toned, ruffled at the edges, leant against his kitchen counter sipping at his cup. He's slightly slumped in the shoulders, less proud and stoic looking than he would look if he was standing in one of his memorable suits. But there is still something drawing her to him in that moment, as she leans against her side of the counter.

"How's the Tea?" She asks, her eyes softening into almost moss green under the golden lamp light as she changes the subject.

"It's... _Tea_ ," He says, double taking her question in a way that gives even more suspicion to her approach. She watches that flash of something in his expression, that lays waist to his internal process and awareness of _her_ , in his apartment, at such an ambiguous hour. She watches the way he switches off any impulse just as quick, his eyes flicking past her.

"It's getting late...you take the bed. I'll take the couch." He says, putting his cup down into the sink.

She frowns immediately. "Harvey. _No._ I did not come here to steal your bed. I'll...take the couch," She says, her eyes roaming at the overly bulky looking couch, square and leather and studded and wholly unappealing as a bed for the night.

"Donna," He sighs, a humour lacing his deep voice. "The couch as is awful to sleep on. I'll take it. Take the bed."

She can feel the worry setting into her own forehead. She assumes that he hasn't changed the mattress since _she-who-shall-not-be-named-but-always-thought-badly-of_ last laid in it.

 _She swallows the urge to roll her eyes at the mere memory that a woman as twisted as Paula Agard ever even ventured into Harvey Specter's bed…_

"I...don't think I need to sleep in a place that housed your many conquests, Harvey." She says. "It's okay."

"Donna," He says, her name bending an objection in his mouth.

"Look...the couch isn't...anyone's finest choice." She admits. "I'll sleep on top of the bed, and you can sleep _in_ the bed. There...the perfect compromise." She reasons.

"What are you, _sixteen_?" He jibes, sneering at her offer. "It's a bed, Donna. Not an invitation to get naked."

" _Does that mean that you usually sleep naked? Is that why it took you so long to come to the-_ "

" _Don't_ ….even." He cuts her off, giving her a look before she can even finish the joke.

She smirks, silenced for one of over a hundred times since they've known one another, as she watches him stride across the lounge with purpose, disappearing into the bedroom.

A pit drops in her stomach, the realisation dawning on her that she has never ever, in her lifetime, nor his, ever slept in his condo.

They had slept together once. _Nearly_ twice. Both times in her small apartment. And many times for her on the couch in his office. But never his place.

The idea of such a thing makes her uneasy.

She looks down at her cup, noticing that any remaining tea she might have had has been sipped cleanly from her designated mug without her full concentration, as she observes him walking out of the bedroom, a small pile of clothes in his hands, that he places on the counter next to her.

"Here," He offers the pile with a forced gruffness. "I'm not having sequins in my bed." He says.

"I didn't come here to cuddle, Harvey." She tells him.

He looks at her, a streak of frustration in his darkened eyes as he regards her. "Good." He challenges.

"Good." She parrots.

"You're impossible," He resolves, rolling his eyes at her.

" _And yet_ , also one of life's _great_ mysteries…" She tells him, smiling smugly.

He gives her a vague look, watching as she picks up the pile of clothes and saunters past him with purpose.

. . ….

Donna is... _here._ In his apartment. _In the middle of the night._ At first look, there's something, oddly sensical about the decision to appear at his door. They've known one another long enough to depend on one another, sure. And he's told her before, that he'd never let anything happen to her. But since their kiss they've...in terms of where they stand in the personal, they've been on separate pages, and yet now, on a seemingly different book than before.

Her coming to him, _like this_ , puts them on an...angle. A tilt, from one another.

Now they're going to be sleeping in the same bed. _His bed._ A bed that he regularly shared with another woman, not so long ago.

The idea of his recent past coming to haunt him once more, sends a shiver down his spine, one he's not fully able to shake when she doesn't reappear after about ten minutes.

He turns off the lights in the lounge, save for once small lamp that casts enough golden light in the large room to light him a way, as he pads with a reticence towards his own bedroom, like he has his grandmother to stay, and they'll be sharing a bed, the completely opposite situation pulling out all the same awkwardnesses in him.

He rounds the doorway, and pauses at the view, the lamp by his bed lighting the edges of the room on fire, and Donna, laid on - _not his side of_ \- the bed, dressed in his Harvard Sweater and grey slacks, her law defying tumble of auburn hair wrapped into a large bun atop of her head.

He watches as she blinks, once, twice and a third time to accompany a worn in question in her eyes.

"What?" She says, examining him.

"Nothing," He says innocently, padding over to his side of the bed, sliding under the covers with a practised ease.

"Exactly _how many_ women have worn this delightful sweater?" She asks, pulling at it with fussy fingers.

"None." He says plainly, his jaw sharpening.

"Not even Scottie?" She questions, rather boldly, and eyebrow arching.

"Nope." He says, popping the 'p'. "She had her own, remember?"

She nods, folding her arms against herself.

"Do you have a...blanket.. _.for me_?" She asks then.

"It's three am, Donna. Just get _in_ the damn bed." He groans, settling against his own pillow, a hand scooping it up to soften the edges as he lays to face away from her.

"You're so...fussy," She says, observing his militance.

After a moment or two, he hears the rustle of sheets and a cool puff of air to rest against his back as she stirs, no less than two foot away from him.

He squeezes his eyes shut for a moment, all feeling and any pent up frustrations - of which there are many - lessening enough to get him to relax once more.

"Goodnight Harvey." He hears her say.

" _Goodnight Donna_." He replies, flattening his body against the sheets.

When he hears a light snore, he revels in the way that it calms his bones, the pull of sleep dragging him finally under.

. . …

A knock at the door on a Sunday morning rouses one of the two people currently occupying the Specter household.

Two people, much closer than they had started or expected to be.

Harvey's eyes snap open, his hand clenching into material that's not the bedsheet, or his own clothes.

His eyes widen, flicking up to freckles and ripe auburn hair that's come undone in the night, like a curtain of autumn leaves against a charcoal sheet and ivory frames. He bites his lip, removing his hand from Donna's waist as she stirs against him. He doesn't have the time to enjoy the happy accident that has befallen him, as a second knock raps on the door.

He groans, his attention stripped as he swings his legs out of the bed, planting his feet into the wooden flooring in a way that causes him to wince at the funny angle that he must have slept at.

He pads through the apartment, yawning against the back of his hand as he glides to the door, opening it with only half his usual interest.

He blinks, eyes widening in a rush at the petite woman at his door.

"Paula…" He says, all the blood draining from his face and any other appendage that may have awoken moments before.

"Harvey...I...sorry, I didn't call before, I'm just...umm. **_Can I come in_**?" She asks, a curtness to her tone despite the stumbling block.

"Uh," He stumbles on his words, red and copper and aurburn flashing in his mind's eye like she's a flag and he's the bull. "Now's not a great time, Paula, _I'm kind of a little_ …"

" **I'm pregnant, Harvey**."

The three words tumble out onto the carpet, heavier than any of Mike's many bags of weed...

"What?" He blinks, once, twice, the sound in his ears sharpening into a confusion and a high pitched drone.

He's sure he can actually feel his heart stopping at her words.

 _His Ex-Girlfriend. Ex-Therapist. Ex..._

Pregnant.

Pregnant...

 _By Him?_

"I…" He starts, his eyebrows knitting into a complex frown.

" _Harvey, I have yoga, so I think I'm gonna_ -"

He feels a hole open up at him as he hears her familiar voice behind him, at the same time witnessing the small woman in front of him visibly straighten at the other woman's entrance.

He turns, a second drop in his gut at the sight of Donna, hair still rippling and his Harvard sweater and slacks hanging from her womanly, almost model-like frame.

"Oh," Donna pauses, mid step. "….Paula." She says, her voice immediately hard edged.

" _Well_ …" Paula says under her breath, her large blue eyes striking into his at their very core. "That didn't take you very long, did it?" Paula says, her eyes dragging back to his. "This is probably...an inconvenience...for you both." She reasons, english-toned sarcasm lacing her words.

"Paula...I... _can we_ -"

"I can go." Donna interrupts, her tone morphing into sharp and withheld in a New York second.

" _Donna_ ," He finds himself saying, his voice feeling harsh and bile tinged, his eyes finding her face yet unwilling gaze.

"Yeah, I should…" She says, nodding to herself, the cogs turning in her mind.

"Are you seriously going to let her leave without telling her?" Paula remarks, the words directed at him, as she folds her arms about herself.

"Tell me what?" Donna pauses, her eyes narrowing.

 _This is like a building, with a foundation of nightmare upon nightmare, rising up between them._

 _Between Donna and he._

"Well, I suppose I'll have to be the bigger person here, then." Paula says, sidestepping Harvey to regard Donna. "I just came from the Doctors. I'm... _pregnant_. Or so it seems."

He feels a lump in his throat as he too turns, piecing together the way the information only solidifies Donna's poker face. He can almost see her running before her feet have even lifted from his polished oak flooring.

"Okay...this doesn't have **anything** to do with me, so I should just…" She stumbles slightly on her words, a quick recovery despite the evident shock.

"Donna," He says, turning to her, a minute head shake as she finally connects with his gaze.

"Harvey." She says, her tone changing for him and only him. " _Paula's right._ You two need to...talk. **Alone.** This is none of my business." She says hurriedly. "Thanks for letting me...crash. I'll just...get my things and be...on my way."

He feels a dead-weight sink into his chest, all those tiny little hopes, any that he may have had the audacity to even entertain about them when he'd first awoke are dashed in sheer seconds, Paula's words pouring ice cold water on the entire affair.

In less than a minute he sees Donna slide to the bathroom, and emerge in a startlingly quick amount of time, suddenly redressed in last nights attire, like some dirty stop-out.

It doesn't look good, her looking _this_ good and perched in his apartment on a Sunday, dressed for Saturday.

 _Sunday used to be his and Paula's day..._

He swallows any feelings that the memory of last night gave him, as he watches, mute as she glides silently past them both.

He is left...almost literally holding the baby.

. . .

When Donna's feet hit the sidewalk, the music of the city flooding into her ears, she feels a bold lurch in her stomach, something violent, and heavy threatening to dislodge itself from her being, something far more serious than any hangover could ever encourage.

 _She thought Paula Agard was a thing of the past._

 _Right now, she seems to be overtaking every possible future…_

 _. . ._

 _You left me in the worst way_  
 _I'm scarred and I'm tear stained_  
 _And when you know I'm hurting_  
 _Put my heart out, it was yours to break_

 _'Need You' By Flight Facilities_


	2. Chapter 2

Author's Notes: Hey Suitors! Hopefully people enjoyed the Premiere, but if you did not, don't despair. Here's an update. There will be another one tomorrow as I split this in two. A x

. . ...

Seattle

 _ **Chapter Two**_

. . ...

He sits down opposite Paula, his hands clasped in his lap, legs crossed at the ankle, observing her smaller form on the other couch.

"So. I gather that the baby is... _mine_?" He offers, a listlessness to his tone.

He watches the words pinch. " _Of course it's yours,_ Harvey. I wouldn't be here if it wasn't." She sighs, folding her arms. "Surely...you think _more_ of me than that?" She offers, a notable edge to her voice.

He feels like an ass, then. _It's a low blow. He shouldn't have pushed it._

"Sorry. So….How far along is it?" He asks.

"Ironically...just over a month and a half." She says, watching as his face collects the information.

They've been broken up for only 5 weeks. The pit in his stomach gets a little bigger.

 _He was only a week off of it never happening at all..._

"Are you...going to keep it?" He asks delicately.

She looks about the room, seeming just as uncomfortable as him, if not more so. "I'm...not sure. And I'm not trying to rope you in...but...I've always wanted a child, Harvey. I'd always used contraception before. But now...that it's happened... _I just_ …"

"How _did_ it happen?" He enquires, his words deliberately careful.

"Are you insinuating that I did this on purpose?"

Her words fly at him like a flash.

"No…" He frowns. "I'm just...asking how it happened. We were being safe." He reminds her.

He's always been very finite with that. Never wanting to slip up, given his long history with an even longer line of women.

"I changed my pill. Turns out that this one is less effective for me than my old one. To tell you the truth I didn't even know that I could have children still, I just... _kept going with it anyway_. Force of habit, I guess." She shrugs.

"Well, I guess...now, you know." He reasons.

It's an odd situation to be in. He can feel the strange off kilter angle that exists between them now. The disjointedness. The distance.

He doesn't feel bad any more, about what happened. They weren't living together, _and yes_ , it _was_ a serious relationship at the time. But over the course of the past few weeks he's realised that he got some things wrong. A few things, actually. Things mixed up in his head; people, memories. The Timelines. The facts.

His head is...clearer now.

"If I kept it...would you...want to be involved?" She asks him.

 _That there, is the billion-dollar-question..._

He falters then, all words like glue in his crooked mouth. "I...Paula...I'm not sure. I'd need to think about it." He answers honestly.

"Because of Donna?" She offers, her words quick and neat and just a touch sharper than he's heards before.

" _ **No**_." He denies, his gaze sharpening too. "Because I came from a broken home, Paula, and I know what it feels like to grow up in that."

The words drop like a weight, like hauling a burdening secret in the ocean.

" _I understand_." She nods. "You don't want the baby thinking that you didn't want it." She reasons.

That's not it, and for a second, he's irritated at the suggestion.

He's many things.

 _Withholding._

 _Solitary._

 _Unyielding._

 _A Dog with a Bone, where work is concerned._

 _A man with a tendency to cut off his nose despite his face, when confronted with fresh hurts..._

But he is **_not_** an abandoner.

He owns his responsibilities and has done for a long time.

"Paula...that is not fair." He counters, his expression dropping. "I ended things. _We_ ended things. And before that, we never talked about having anything like _that_." He clarifies. "You've...kind put me on the spot, here." He explains.

"I know that, Harvey." She says, sitting back against the couch rest.

Silence turns into a chasm between them. He's stuck in between thought. In between this planet sized situation on the periphery of his own world.

"I can't believe that I'm saying this... _but_..." He reels in a breath, his hands gently clapping together in a nervous gesture. "Is there any chance, that you _won't_ keep it?" He offers, meeting her eye.

 _There it is. The decision that sits on apex of his entire world turning from orange to grey..._

He watches as she inhales at the question, something intangible in her expression.

This isn't some case he can win or some company that he can close. He can't pay this person to go away. And he hasn't the heart to threaten her.

He waits. Because essentially, he is helpless right now.

This is a woman, with _his_ possible baby in her womb, and his balls incongruously in her fist. No matter how he plays it, will be waiting on her. That is an undeniable fact.

"At this point, I'm not sure either way. I just...I felt that you should know, _first_." She replies, seeming to hold her cards very closely against her chest.

"Right." He nods, taking in her words. For a moment or two, his attention feathers out as his eyes pass the large windows, tracing the expansive view behind her seated form. He notices a stray bird flying over the edges of Central Park, with wind in its wings and no strict direction, silhouetted against the mottled bice and baby blue sky. He wonders how he would feel if this had been thirteen years ago. If Donna was the one sat opposite him right now, framed with thick ginger bangs and a fluffy sweater, telling him that their one night together had left them with a new responsibility to add to that new job of theirs.

 _Would he have said the same? Would he feel the same as he does right now? Guilty, and at odds with his place in the scenario?_

He feels a sharp high pitched sound stream into his ears, clapping out when he hears her voice.

"Harvey?"

He blinks several times, his eyes flicking to the woman, with eyes wide, suspended on his awkward silence.

 _He knows then. Knows it in his gut._

He would feel _very_ different, indeed.

"Thank you for telling me..." He says. "You know how I feel about it, but...we should probably talk more once you've made the decision." He reasons.

"Okay." She nods, sensing her time is up as she stands, holding her bag to herself.

"For what it's worth Harvey...I'm sorry things didn't work out between us." She says, drawing in a hiss of a breath. "It would make things easier. Given the circumstances." She says, a bittersweet laugh falling out of her.

"Paula...I...I'm not sure that I even _want_ kids. So...if makes you feel better, it might not have." He winces.

 _It's a hard truth. But one that she has to hear._

He's finally thinking clearly.

And there are now other things to think of.

She nods, looking into his eyes for a moment longer than she has since she had arrived.

He wonders if she's looking for more than the sentiment of his words, as she takes another second.

"I'll call you in the week?" She offers.

"Okay." He nods, a careful smile on his lips.

"Bye Harvey." She offers.

" _Bye Paula_." He returns.

When he closes the door behind him,

All he can think of,

 _Is_ _Ginger Bangs_.

. . .

He doesn't seek her out. He wants to, but he doesn't have concrete information yet, and to be honest, his mind is becoming addled by an acute field of fog, something impenetrable, holding him apart from the world in a freezing kind of daze.

He spends what's left of the morning running in the park, feeling the hot air in his lungs, and the sweat drip down his back, trying to pass the day as quickly as he can, ignoring the many people going about their own days with an opposing sense of Sunday earnest. He pushes harder than he ever has, anything to tired out his body from it's internal rhythm. Over the years he's kept himself fit and durable for the long haul. Right now, ideally, he needs a huge case to channel his energy into. But there's nothing right now, just perfunctory work and the many levels of transitioning down from Managing Partner to Named Partner. In the afternoon he catches up on paperwork that he'd brought home the day before. Anything to pull his mind forward, instead of remaining static in this unbearable din.

It's times like this, when he welcomes the sound of her inane chatter, to tune out his inability to build a thought, hoping that if she talks long enough, that she'll inevitably awaken one for him. And often, she does just that.

When the sun turns on the head of the moon, he thinks again of going to her, of calling at her door. It rides him like a protocol lodged in his brain. To go to her.

He goes to her, when he is at odds.

But he can't go to her with this.

But he wants to. And that is enough.

. . …

 ** _It's been years since you came around to these parts of my mind_**

 ** _All I can recall is you restin' naked every time_**

' _Cuffed' By Nick Hakim_

. . ….

Donna Paulsen spends her Sunday on autopilot. Forceful. Methodical. Militant in her day, by sheer design of will.

She takes a cab and grabs her key from Louis, explaining that she had spent the night in a hotel and ignoring his fussiness at her not having called him the night before. She's thankful that Sheila is in attendance, giving her an immediate out, as she heads straight home to change, before going to Yoga. Having missed her usual morning class, _due to her strangely late rise_ , she fits herself into an extra long bikram session, something that sweats out the alcohol from the night before, and pushes her to her physical limit enough that her mind doesn't feel the need to reel.

She does her best to distract herself, with washing things that she doesn't take to the dry cleaners, and the general house chores. She resists the impulse to shop or spend money, the idea seeming too lavish for such a pensive mind. She's retreating, because she needs to work out how to deal with the entire situation with more than just feelings and reactions.

She's folding clothes when her phone rings. She's calmed enough by now that she doesn't even look at the caller ID, knowing it can't possibly be Harvey, because she has her own ringtone for him. She picks up her phone with one hand, juggling a pile in the other as she makes her way to the bedroom.

" _Donna speaking_ ," She chimes.

"Well...I've certainly missed _that_ voice,"

She halts in the hallway, the distinct smile-ridden voice painting her own voice a mismatch of colours, from happy to moved.

She sighs heavily, a crooked smile bending at the sound of her best friend's familiar tone. She falters, her usual confidence lost in the sounds of someone special so far away from reach. " _Why, if it isn't the great Michelle Ross_." She chimes, collecting herself.

"How is the great _Harriet Specter_ doing on this fine Sunday?" Her friend asks.

 _It hits like a rock._ All their games and making fun suddenly doesn't seem so fun, off of the back of a day like today.

So for the first time, she does something that she would never usually do.

"Paula's pregnant." She blurts out, feeling a strange release that seems to come from confessing to a voice down the phone.

" _ **What**_?" Rachel's voice falls flat, earning a sense of comfort against her own initial feeling.

"Yeah…that was my reaction, too..." She confesses.

"How did you find out? _Did Harvey tell you_?" Rachel asks.

"No...Paula told me. At Harvey's door. After we woke up... _together_." She notes.

She feels her internal judgement score a number, the pit of her stomach dropping in the jarring memory of the entire mess of a morning that still seems too fresh for real words.

"Oh my God! Did you... _sleep_ with Harvey? _Are you two_ …?" Rachel asks, jumping the gun.

She chuckles to herself.

 _If only she were in that deep._

 ** _Always in the periphery. Never in the centre._**

"No. _I_...locked myself out last night. And you're…" She swallows, the threat of emotion drawing up her throat. "No one else has a spare, so I...went to Harvey's." She divulges. "We went to bed, woke up to Paula...at his door. _Pregnant_."

"How did he take it?" Rachel asks.

"I don't know. I...got out of there as soon as I could change out of his _Harvard Sweater,_ " She says, matter of factly, the lilt of irony in her words.

"Oh my God…" Rachel merely sounds on the other end.

 _She might have stayed. She didn't even have the time to blink, to even wake fully before chaos fell at their door. His door. The door..._

"I'm _so_ sorry we're not there." Rachel says.

Her shoulders fall then, a tired smile stretching across her face. "You're living your dreams, Rach." She says. "And I am _so_ proud of you for that…"

"One sec, Mike wants you," Rachel says, the halt sudden.

"Well _he's a little forward,_ " Donna jokes, the tone deliberately obtuse, as Rachel chuckles on the other end.

She swallows. Mike and her have always had an unspoken bond. Like two points on a circuit board, throwing energy to one another.

 _She can't lie to him. He can sniff out lies, like a well primed bloodhound._

She readies herself as she hears him take the phone. "Hey gorgeous," He says, all pomp and circumstance in his voice.

"If your wife hears you talking like that, she'll divorce your tiny ass." She warns.

" _I don't know_ ," He reasons. "She's right beside me and she seems...okay with it." He muses. _She can almost hear him shrug_. "And by the way, **_my ass_** ," He warns, humour-filled and on point like always. " _Is impeccable_. And only mildly-offended, by the way." He quips.

 _The only one who could ever really keep up with her..._

"So... _you heard_ , then?" She supposes.

"Yeah, Rach wrote it down on a post-it note as you two were talking,"

"She's stealthy, that little lady-Ross," She notes.

"You okay?" She hears him ask, the usual Mike Ross-styled-care in his voice.

"I'm...putting it out of my mind, Mike." She says as she places the pile of clothes down on her bed. "I have to."

"How's Harvey dealing with it?" He asks.

"Honestly...I don't know. I haven't spoken to him since I left her stood at his door."

"I know you're gonna say I'm a broken record, but...he loves _you,_ Donna. Not her." He tells her.

"It's not about that, Mike." She says, ignoring the direction that his words are headed down. "She...may _be_ in his life again. Permanently. That changes everything."

"It doesn't change the fact that he put you first when it mattered." He reminds her.

"If he's having a baby with her, he _would have to_ put her first." She counters.

 _There is truth to her words. Something tangible and logical to them. Something ironclad._

 _Now matter what, it's that, that he can't deny._

 _His silence speaks volumes for her acute state of mind._

"Whatever happens Donna. I'm sure Harvey is going to factor you into any decision that he makes." Mike reasons.

"I guess we'll just have to see." She shrugs, feeling the need to run from such a subject. "Anyway, enough about the roving edges of _my_ life. _How's the good life_?"

"It's... _busy_. We bought a house." He says. She smiles at the sound of pride in his voice.

" _I know_. Rach sent photos. It looks wonderful. Very 'cheaper by the dozen'." She compliments.

"And our offices are shaping up nicely," He says. "But let me guess, she's shown you _those_ too?"

"What can I say. _Our girl loves to chat_." She smiles proudly.

"How about you ask me something you _don't_ know and I'll answer that instead?" He offers, only half joking.

"Michael...you should know by now. _I'm Donna_. There isn't anything I don't know." She tells him.

 _Apart from the fate of Harvey and his unborn child to a rife psychopath..._

"If you need _anything_?" He offers, the sentiment thick, and immediately making her smile. "Maybe to castrate Harvey?" He jokes.

"Oh, I'm sure that right now, he's wishing he'd done that himself." She remarks.

She hears him chuckle slightly on the the other end. "Seriously, though, Donna. _Anything you need,_ " He presses.

"I'll be sure to call Rachel." She smiles widely.

 _She misses this kid far too much for her own liking._

"I love you. Rach says bye." He says, his voice bending with a warmth.

"Love you both." She smiles sadly. "Bye."

She ends the call, placing her phone down on the bed as she picks up the pile of clothes.

 _And she thought that Mike and Rachel leaving the city would be the biggest change this year._

 _How wrong was she…?_

. . …

 ** _If there's a God_**

 ** _I wonder what she looks like_**

 ** _I bet she looks like you_**

 ** _I bet she looks like you_**

' _I bet she looks like you' By Nick Hakim._

. . ….

He wakes to a Monday morning, and only one thought.

 _Donna._

He had resisted going to her much later last night, when, alcohol addled and one-track-minded, he had felt the urge to seek her out, one of many impulses running through his head.

 _Knowing his luck, if he made it through the door, he'd be having a second conversation..._

Despite that, he still needs to see her. To tell her that he's sorry that Paula had arrived at his door. He doesn't need to be sorry, and he knows that. _She came to him, after all. They both had._ But he feels a responsibility to her, to keep her in the loop. To factor her in his decision making. Call it habit, or routine, or loyalty, or something else that they never really speak of, but it's there, blaring in neon lights, reminding him of her.

He dresses with care, forming the best possible version of himself that he can. Not a hair out of place, every cufflink set, his tie symmetrical against the middle of his chest and his lapels flanking it with a slickness.

Sure, he could fudge it a little, leave something behind to ignite her interest or play on her fussy need to perfect him and keep him at his best. But he wants to demonstrate, that even in this tense situation, he is still thinking of her. Still maintaining certain standards.

He sips the last of his vanilla flavoured coffee, placing his mug in the sink as he moves to pluck his suit jacket off of the back of a barstool, twisting it behind his form with a whoosh as he makes his way to the door, pulling each arm into the jacket until it fits like a second skin against his shoulders and back. He pulls the door open in one motion, and for a second, he expects her to be there, behind the door, waiting for him, with an animated expression and a loose excuse for being there, to hide her real intentions.

But in truth, she's never done a thing he expects when it comes to them.

He swallows the thought, shutting the door behind himself.

. . …

 ** _I try in vain to think that they will go tomorrow_**

 ** _I try to forget my torments_**

 ** _I sometimes hear from my window speak the voices_**

 ** _I see there the valleys where I'm not going_**

 ** _I often hear from my window_**

 ** _Blowing the wind_**

 ** _In the shade I hesitate again_**

'Cajun' Isaac Delusion

. . …

For Donna, the partner's kitchen is a very different place to what it used to be. No more Rachel stretching for tea bags that are out of her reach on the top shelf, or catching her for a one-to-one. No more Mike, nibbling absent-mindedly on certain food items that have been left around, or following her there out of boredom, watching her assemble her lunch with obscure questions and comments, usually ending with him devouring a sizeable portion of what she's laid out - normally a portion and then some because she knows he's hopeless with food, unlike his new wife, who usually watches, apologetically but with a smile.

Donna is now left to her own devices, with fewer tete a tetes, adult playdates and gossip sessions to look forward to now that her friends have finally flown the coop.

" _Donna,_ "

Louis, on the other hand, is still very much Louis.

 _'Prunies', papercuts, paranoid spells and all._

She smiles softly into her cup, eyes flicking up to see her friend saunter into the kitchen with purpose.

"Louis." She regards warmly. "How's your Monday morning been?" She offers.

He pauses against the counter, animated as usual and that slight twitch to his gait, as his hands tap on the countertop with a fizzing energy.

"Pretty Fantastic, actually." He smiles. "Templeton International just signed with Indoscope, so now...I have great pleasure of adding them to my client list." He boasts, bending to the fridge to pluck a strangely muddy coloured bottle with the words _'Hands off, Or get Litt up'_ written on it. "When the paperwork arrives, Gretchen won't know what hit her." He grins almost maniacally.

"I think we both know that Gretchen is more than up to the task," She smiles, sipping at her coffee.

"And how is the wonderful Donna, today?" He asks.

"Good. I'm….. _good_." She says, forgetting herself for a moment long enough for Louis to smell a rat.

She feels her internal gears grind.

"That's sounds ambiguous. Is everything okay?" He says, unaware of the depth of her feeling.

 _Everything is not okay. Things are...complicated. Although, out of the two of them, people would peg Louis for the one with issues, and not her._

She turns to her friend, watching him pour out the rather goopy liquid into a nearby glass.

Somethings halts her usual response, as she is reminded of the feeling the truth awoke, when admitting things to Mike and Rachel the day before.

"Actually, Louis... _I_ -"

Her words stick in her throat, her eyes flicking to the door to witness Harvey, sharply set and eyes trained almost exclusively on her.

He's strangely handsome looking today, and tall, almost too upright, in a slate grey suit and a black tie.

All business and forward thinking direction.

 _She just hopes that his forward thinking direction isn't solely directed at her..._

She straightens on the spot, her cup held against pearl white chiffon and silk.

"Harvey," Louis regards casually, taking a sip of his drink.

Harvey's gaze flicks to Louis then, wincing. Neither miss the very thick dark green sludgy handlebar moustache that appears above the man's lip and cheeks.

"Hey, Louis…?" Harvey furrows his brow, observing his Partner with a held entertainment. "You got a little... _on your_..." He pauses, gesturing awkwardly to his own face.

Louis frowns deeply, his hand patting his nose at random, and in typical Louis fashion completely missing the spot.

She can't help but smile to herself, watching Harvey wrangle with the strange smear on the man's face.

Harvey's always been rather fussy when it comes to stains and the general grime of being human.

 _She wonders if he was a robot in another life...a frustratingly sexy, overly complicated humanoid kind of man..._

"You might wanna….check that." Harvey says, snapping her out of thought, as she watches him narrow his eyes at Louis, whose own widen in a colourful self consciousness.

"What, do I? _Do I?_ Is it all over-" Louis asks, this words fumbling. "Oh my god, I can't feel it..." He says, his eyes shooting to his lip, as he wipes the wrong spot, his tongue poking out to lick his lips. "Is it gone? Did I get it, or is it still...?" He asks.

"Yeah," Harvey nods lavishly. "I'd just go...take a look." He says, making a face.

"Oh god. _Excuse me_." Louis says hurriedly, marching past them and out to the men's bathroom.

"You could have just handed him a napkin." She reprimands softly, as he regards her.

"Perhaps," He concedes, lightly. "But then I wouldn't get the chance to talk to you. _Alone_." He resolves, his hands sliding into his pockets. "You're...avoiding me." He tells her, taking several steps towards her.

"No…" She disagrees, her voice bending to the contrary. "I'm having a well earned coffee break." She defends.

"You've not been at your desk all day." He observes.

"I'm...helping Louis with the Associates," She shrugs one shoulder.

"No you're not," He tells her, impatience in his voice. "Because _Louis_ has been working with them on the Templeton Deal all morning." He tells her, his jaw flexing with a carefully framed frustration. "I went to the library, Donna." He points out, a catch in his tone.

 _The jig is up. It's slowly coming about that she's no more able to lie to him than he is to her._

"I've been...filing? _In the file room_?" She offers, the question painting her lie rather straight. "Copying. I've been with the copier." She adds coolly.

" _Donna_ …" He placates, take a step towards her. She watches him check about himself before directing his attention back to her. "Look...I'm sorry... _about Paula?_ " He says.

His directness towards her is off kilter in such a public place, and for a moment that look in his eyes, pure and unbridled and made up of their past sends the kind of shiver down her back that she'd sooner avoid dealing with right now.

"Harvey…" She sighs, placing her cup on the counter top. "It's none of my business." She tells him. " _Like I said_. It's between the two of you." She insists, ignoring the strained feeling in her throat.

"Donna," He says, her name layered with the kind of sentiment that only _his_ eyes can carry the weight of. She watches his hands tap against the counter, a mere inch or two from where she leans.

"Harvey….this isn't about work, so...can we...just talk about this later?" She blanket covers any emotion that's threatening bubble over, sliding past him like silk against steel. "I have to…" She indicates, pointing to the door.

She doesn't look back.

And he doesn't grab for her.

Some things are better left unfinished right now.

. . ...

 ** _When you're so high you (Don't think)_**

 ** _When you fall from the sky you (Won't break)_**

 ** _So come down from the clouds_**

 ** _Come down_**

 ** _So some down from the clouds_**

 ** _Come down_**

 ** _I've been loving you, too long_**

 ** _I've been loving you, for too long._**

'Drops' By Jungle

. . ...


	3. Chapter 3

Author's Notes: Hey Suitors! Someone asked about the second surprise...all in good time. :wicked face: A xox

. . ...

 _ **Chapter 3**_

. . ...

Harvey Specter is so incredibly frustrated.

 _Mike is gone._

 _Paula is back._

 _An unplanned baby is literally circling his personally future._

 _And Donna is…_

He turns the tumbler in his hands, watching the amber liquid slosh from side to side in the half darkness, the dulcet tones of Nick Hakim's 'Needy Bees' spinning on his record player; a mixture of soul and effervescence, a rare gift from Mike, 'a new LP to rival all that other old crap', he had said, when handing the gift to his friend and long time Boss.

 _And the kid was right. Not about the crap part, of course..._

It has something of the old for him, something fitting to an era he's grown to love, mixed in with a new modern wave that Mike would approve of.

He can hear Mike sounding off in his head now, _Finally a record on the shelf that doesn't require a bus pass and a pension…_

He misses that kid like a brother.

He's big enough to realise that he's not bitter about him leaving. More, sad at the loss. He's proud beyond imagination at the kind of man he's become, and the stellar lawyer that he's making himself out to be. He should have seen it coming. That kid always did have a gold plated moral compass, despite the rocky start.

They are different. He realises that now. They were the perfect team, but singularly, very different indeed. He always assumed that they would be destined to do great things together. And they had, in retrospect. But now was the time for him to chart his own course, alone.

Not completely alone, of course. He still has Donna. _In a fashion…_

He can't ever let that change. He'll pass his last breath before he lets that happen. But he can't help thinking that when it comes to Paula Agard,

 _ **Donna Paulsen has a habit of retreating from him.**_

He frowns, hearing the record come to an end.

That impulse flares up once more, dashing any other thought that he has.

He has to let it all out. Get it off his chest.

He needs to see her.

Now is not the time to leave things unsaid.

. . ...

 ** _I can't tell when this would end_**

 ** _You're just wild, and this pass so slow_**

 ** _I just listen to the noise_**

 ** _And the silence in your voice_**

 ** _The sound is in all I hear_**

'Needy Bees' by Nick Hakim

. . ...

He rapps his hand on the door, his eyes catching at the bright gold numbers, hanging as a constant reminder of all that has still not changed between them.

 _He wonders, in some other assembly of them, they are happy, and stable and not dwindling into middle age without someone to fall next to at night..._

He watches the door open slowly, and a familiar wave of coppery auburn hair, a signal of the woman that he has come for, appears before him. His eyes flick to her face, observing the mere hint of a frown on her pale features, her expressive hazel eyes softening in contrast against the sharpened eyebrows that hang with an undeveloped question.

He mashes his lips together, all at once overcome by her presence in front of him, and every impulses that it seems to awaken.

"Hey." He says, noticing the way she seems over protective of her space. Like a guardian at the gate.

"Hey." She mimics, her lips twisting, as if she's trying to stop herself from launching into a tirade, a download of things playing on her mind.

She seems more emotionally open than before.

His hands slide into his pockets then, the saggy feeling of being at a stalemate. Right at her doorstep. A place that he feels like he's spent a large portion of his life standing at. His eyes drift to the black silk pyjamas and robe that she's wearing, until he feels himself leer slightly and picks his gaze back up, his head tilting at her then.

"Are you okay?" He asks, his attention direct.

"No." She says, matter of factly, attempting to smile with an honesty to it that seems so chaste and so bittersweet. There's none of her usual confidence and bravado in her gait. Only a quietness, that's seemingly open to him on this one occasion. It's a rare thing for him to see. "I'm not." She admits, stripping herself emotionally bare.

 _Paula Agard seems to cut Donna Paulsen very deep indeed._

" _Look, Donna…_ " He starts.

"Harvey, you don't need to explain." She insists.

"But I want to," He insists, silencing her in once moment. "Look, what's happening... _with Paula and I_...it doesn't change things. It _won't_...change things. I won't let it." He promises.

She seems to sink on the spot then, the gesture seeming more so without her usual heels and power dresses and bravado in spades.

 _It's times like these that she pulls at his protective streak, looking so fragile, so...at odds with the world._

"Of course it changes things, Harvey." She frowns, turning back to him. "She's having _your baby_."

"But... _I_ …I can't change that." He stammers, the words an effort to even consider.

She sighs, seeing his unease with the concept. "I know that. That's why I'm not...blaming you for how _I_ feel." She shrugs. "Look, we've both had a long day, maybe we should just..." She

He steps forward in an instant. "Donna...don't punish me for this... _mistake_ , that I didn't even know I made." He half-begs.

"Really?" She pauses, a lightness of distraction to her then. "You've _never_ had this happen before? _Not ever_?" She scrutinises. "All those years, and...all of those women?" She remarks.

His face falls in a second, giving her a look of disappointment. "Donna. That is _**not**_ fair. I was in a relationship with her. I...have always been safe, when it comes to that." His ire is rising now, and she's not helping things. "You really think I want a bunch of little me's running around the city without my knowledge?" He offers.

" _Is that a...trick question_?" She asks, sounding like him.

His face twists into that of frustration, and her deviation from the theme of his house call only frustrates him further.

"Donna...will you just...let me in?" He says. "I don't want to have _this_ kind of discussion in your hall." He notes sharply.

By the way she looks at him, he wonders if she thinks he's referring to the situation at hand, or something altogether different.

"Harvey...it's late." She sigh heavily, her excuse weak at best.

He stands a little straighter then, feeling closed off from her in a way that he's beginning to hate. "Please don't shut me out over this."

"I need time, Harvey."

"No, you don't. You're retreating. Like you've done every time something involves her."

"Don't put this on me." She says, a striking flash in her eyes.

"I'm not, Donna, just...ugh... ** _let me in_**." He says, riding his own frustrations, then. She isn't helping matters, her being like this.

He sighs then, rolling his eyes at her difficulty. Gathering himself, he watches stubbornly, as she relents, finally, walking to the lounge, as he closes the door behind them both, shutting out the world until it's just them.

When he enters the lounge, watching her wander into the kitchen, he shakes his head at another try at avoiding.

"You want a drink?" She calls half-heartedly behind herself.

"Sure, He sighs, shrugging his coat off, as he lowers himself onto the couch.

He can't escape the feeling of deja vu that ripples around them, as he sees her pop a bottle of red, laying two glasses on the counter to pour a third of a glass into each, before padding over to him gently, handing him a glass as she takes a leisurely sip of hers.

He allows the wine to swing from side to side in the glass, the weight of it calming his nerves before he takes a well earned sip.

 _The wine is the same, and if this were any other moment in time he would mention it._ But there are bigger things at stake right now.

"So…" He starts.

" _So_ …?"

"This is...more awkward than I thought it would be." He says, scratching at his head in befuddlement.

" _You're telling me._ " she agrees.

His eyes find hers then. She looks so...alive. So bright. Like a star. It's like looking at your best friend, and then realising that they are your whole world, that gentle slip of comfort into completely reverie.

 _Pour another glass of her warm smoke_

 _Into the river and let it rest_

 _'Til my thoughts get weary, until they float_

 _I feel the smoke rising, heart in my throat_

 _Pour another glass of her warm smoke_

 _Until I sleepwalk back home_

 _With the stench of her perfume all on my coat_

 _And yet another morning, I wake and I'm alone_

"So...I guess...tell me...what she said." She demands carefully.

 _Always the first one out of the two of them..._

"Okay," He says, clearing his throat. "She...told me that she's five weeks pregnant. It happened...a week before we broke up." He notes. "She...doesn't know if she wants to keep it, and she asked me if I wanted to be involved." He explains, his head bowing with a strange sense of somehow having done something wrong.

"Do you... _want_ to be...involved?"

"I don't know...I…" He mumbles, withdrawing from the question.

"Harvey," She encourages, a weight to her words, yet something dead-ended in them.

"Okay…" He sighs, gathering himself. "You want the truth?" He offers.

"That would be nice." She says, smirking lightly.

"I...asked her if there was any way she _wasn't_ going to keep it." He divulges. He doesn't look at her face. _Too scared that she'll paint him like the asshole that even he can hear himself as..._

"And what did she say?" She asks.

"Like I said," He shrugs "She hasn't made up her mind, right now."

"And...you... _don't_ want kids?" She clarifies.

There is something in her expression that catches him. Something she's leaving out, or covering.

"No." He frowns, shaking his head minutely. "Not with somebody that I ended things with."

"But _you only_..." She begins, only to taper off her words as soon as she's formed them.

"What?" He frowns, catching the hesitation in her voice and cancelled expression on her gentle features.

"Nevermind." She says, looking away from him.

"No Donna, _not_ 'nevermind'. _What_?" He presses, leaning towards her to reconnect their gaze.

"It's none of my business, Harvey." She says, making a small jerk in her shoulders, sitting back against the couch, almost physically backing out of her words.

" _It's your business, Donna._ Now, what?" He demands, not allowing her to lose his rather intense gaze.

After a moment or two she relents, her gaze flying above them in an effort to collect herself. "You only ended things with her... _because of me_."

"You think I regret that decision?" He offers, allowing the words to fall out with a flatness.

" _Don't you_?" She asks.

"No." He frowns, shaking his head. "I don't regret it, Donna…"

Initially, he did. He hated been caught up between a woman that he loved, and a woman who had his heart, two of which felt so interchangeable at times, that until the gavel dropped, and one of them changed, he was at odds.

But now, there was no doubt in his mind.

 _He would cross literal oceans just to keep her._

 _Sometimes, more so lately, it keeps him up all night._

 _And sometimes it lights his dark corners with a golden glow._

 _But, despite everything. Even now...he wouldn't change it for the world._

"Okay…" She nods simply, taking another sip of her wine.

"If anything, _I realised_ …"

"What?" She asks.

The words are stuck in _his_ throat then. He's not sure he should ever say them. Least of all, to her.

 _She didn't feel anything when she kissed him, after all._

 _She didn't feel anything, and she told him so._

That fact has been playing on his mind like a broken record.

Like a dead weight to carry around with him.

"Harvey," She's the one to press then, hooking his eyes with hers, suddenly similarly dark in nature.

"Nothing. It doesn't matter." He shakes it off.

" _Now who's withholding_." She jibes, a softness to her assault just by the rare look in her moss coloured eyes.

He sighs, preparing himself for the admission.

"I...thought...that if it were _you_...coming to me...after _the other time_...that...I might not have said the same things to you that I said to her." He shrugs, to offset the exposed feeling in his chest.

"So, like... _immediate abortion_ then?" She jokes, eyes comically wide. "That's tough. _I get it._.." She quips, taking a sip from her glass as she seems to relax in the environment of her own humour.

He shakes his head at her then, his eyes a gentle warning against her nature. Somehow, his face settles on a seriousness that has her transfixed on him, passing over her playfulness and heading straight into her core.

"I would never, ever do that to you Donna; _you know that_." He tells her, his tone soft, peeking over the valleys of his deep voice.

" _Do I_?" She breathes.

"Well...if you don't then you should." He reaffirms.

She blinks, taking in his words with one long breath.

"I guess you've always said, _what's mine is yours_ ," She says, irony lacing her words as she takes another sip of her wine.

" _Have I_?" He enquires, trying to make less of a truth of it, in his bent smile and notable challenge in his eyes.

 _So, she does know_ , he thinks to himself.

 _He needs to remember that for the future._

She rolls her eyes then, deflecting his intention in one perfected gesture.

She seems unlike herself tonight. This is new territory for them. Her, open. Him, probing her.

"I don't want _that_ to change... _this. Us._ " He tells her.

"Harvey...if she's having your baby, then no matter what you do, it will most definitely change us." She tells him.

"I won't let it." He says, staunchly, sitting a little more forward then he should. " ** _You know_** **_I can't_** …"

Her head tilts, observing his closeness with a sadness, a frankness almost.

"Harvey...If you're going to be as good a father as I know you're capable of being, then _you would_." She says.

"Do you always have to be so….self sacrificing?" He says then, a snap in his words.

"Do you always have to run after women that come back to bite you in the ass?" She counters.

"Are you including _you_ in that?" He throws the words, watching as they land

" _ **Harvey**_ ,"

"Last time I sat here...I told you _things_...and then I... _ran_."

She chuckles to herself for a moment, before her eyes flick back to his with a tiredness. "I remember, Harvey." She says, matter of factness flooding her features.

"Did you mean it...when you said you didn't...feel...anything?"

" _When I kissed you_?" She checks.

"Yes." He says, nodding simply.

She's silent once more. If he wasn't so interested in her answer he might have revelled in the opportunity to just look at her.

" _Donna_ ," He presses.

"Harvey, now is not the time to have _that_ conversation." She remarks, seeming to retreat.

" _And why the hell not_?" He fires at her, irked by another attempt to shut him down.

"Because your ex girlfriend is pregnant with your child, Harvey! Do you really need a bigger reason than that?" She says, snatching the words, almost, a reprimand in her tone.

"You kissed me _when I was with her_...it shouldn't change your answer." He counters, quickly. "Unless you lied to me…?" He guesses.

"Harvey...adding this to that is not going fix things." She says, picking up her glass in a rush, as she glides over to the kitchen counter.

"Is that what you think?" He frowns, his eyes narrowing in disbelief. "You think I want cover that with _this_?"

He hears her sigh, and the sound of wine glugging into the bottle. She turns to him, her face a mixture of muddled emotions.

"Honestly, I don't know what you want right now," She says. "But I'm feeling attacked."

"Donna,"

"No, Harvey...You came _here_. Over two years ago, and you told me that you loved me, and then you left _just_ when things got difficult. You then, refused to talk with me about it, or even explain how you loved me and then…. _after everything_...when I told you that I wanted more, and needed to work that out, you were so scared I meant _you_ , that you went to her."

"Donna...you wouldn't answer," He says, half under his breath, quiet enough so the words don't cut him as deep as they really should.

"I don't give a shit Harvey. _You went to_ _ **her**_ …" She spits.

"I also _left_ her, because she made me choose between the two of you and **guess what, Donna**... **I chose _you._** " He says, the pressure in his voice rising. "And for the record, I asked you what more mean't, and you couldn't tell me. Like always….you don't tell me even when I point blank ask!"

"Because all you do is hurt me! Like now...what is this doing, Harvey? You want to talk about it, but you don't think about what this is doing to me? Apart from reminding me that she had you and gets to keep _some_ …"

"'Some'… _what_ , Donna?" He asks. "Well?" He demands, contempt etching at his words as he stares at her, his face lit like a warning he's not sure he's able to come through on. "You better finish that sentence," He warns, his threat empty, but no more doused with feeling than an Australian bush fire.

"Some...part of you that…" She steals a breath, clearly wrestling with the words. "That no one else can ever have," She relents, finally, shaking her head at the forced admission.

"Donna." He manages, her words suspending him in a moment of shock.

"And I know it's stupid. And we're not...that...but...I... _ **hate**_...that you got _her_ pregnant. And it is literally eating me up inside that it is _her_ in particular." She admits. "Not Scottie. Or Zoe, or or god forbid even Esther Litt. It's her...and I hate it."

"Donna," He says, standing in front of her. "She's not who you think she-" He begins.

" _No Harvey_ …" She cuts him off, wind in her verbal sails. "I...went to her…when you were seeing her _as your therapist_ , when we couldn't find you? And she knew...she knew our past. She knew enough to know that you don't just date your ex-client, _even if_ he swans up to your house in a flashy convertible with a line or two. But she...doesn't care. And...when I went to her, and apologized for kissing you, she didn't bat an eyelid in telling me that I wasn't getting my job back, unless I swore that nothing like that would ever happen again. And I couldn't swear to it, because...I can't be sure of that. Because _that_ , _is just how we are_. It's how we've _always_ been and now she has that piece of you that _I can't ever even dream of_ -"

His lips silence her, pulling all the air from her lungs in a rush of his hands against her tear stained face and his tongue sliding into her mouth like he's kissed her a hundred times more than reality would ever know.

He remembers their last kiss like it was yesterday.

 _The effortlessness and fluidity with which she slid against him, her arms snapping around his shoulders like she was so simple, just a girlfriend with a bad day wanting to seek a little impromptu comfort from the man in her life. It didn't seem desperate enough, instead more instinctual, like she was ordering a common occurrence in her day. The way her nails scratched down his neck like a mark, and the way her hair had fallen about his face like a curtain, obscuring them from the world, had slapped any shred of coherence that he had left clean out of him, falling against the glass walls that held them in place. For a moment he had fallen, completely, his mouth beginning to respond the the gesture, his nostrils flaring at the smell of her, priming him for everything except the second after that; when she had inevitably ripped herself away from him, moments after connecting with him, and fleeing the scene like a stint at a confessional, he was left, wondering why it felt so natural, and why he hadn't pulled away._

This moment is different. The way he kisses her is the opposite to the way that she kisses him. She kisses him with fire; with smoke ripples, flame-like lashes and a sharp snap. He kisses her like he is made up of wave upon wave, growing in power and rushing her out to sea with the saltiness of her tears, sweeping her up in a tumultuous valley of moving sentiment where she is helpless and he is the stronger one. Where he carries her, threatening with every second to take them both under, and to be truly undone.

He gathers her against him, silk against cotton, his hands grasping at her hips to press her against his surprisingly fervent need of her.

She seems to feel it too, much to his disappointment, as she pulls away from him, panting, a gasp falling out into the small space that she makes between them, her hands bracing for space against his upper arms.

"Harvey, stop." She pants, trying to catch her breath back.

"Donna," He groans, a protest falling out as he straightens, his hot seeming hands balling into fists just to stop himself from reaching for her again.

"I can't do this...not whilst everything's so... _uncertain_." She says, running a hand over her flushed face.

"Why not?" He manages, fighting with his own impulses.

"Because...things will change if she does keep it, and adding this to that right now... _it won't last_." She confesses. "I...just...I need time to process all of this. You _need_ that time, too." She reminds him.

He sighs heavily, encumbered with the many emotional weights that she's made him suddenly so very aware of.

 _She's right._

 _Like always, and even after that._

 _This seems like an achingly familiar grind to a halt._

He groans, something ornery and restricted in his throat.

She finally straightens, taking a step away from him, her face observing his. "You should go." She says, in a flash of the her that he's been used to.

He doesn't want to go. He wants to stay and live out his dreams, blocking out the oncoming nightmare that seems to be here just to test them.

When he regards at her, finally and rather reluctantly, she is looking at him with some held emotion, that seems to soften her features.

He wonders if she does love him, or if she just pities how he loves her.

He straightens, gathering himself with a finality. In the back of his head he's thoroughly pleased with the sight of her, dishevelled; her hair slightly fluffy, her lips swollen and obviously kissed and her clothes not quite as neat as he had first glimpsed them as being.

She gives him a look, like the mind reader she most certainly is.

"I'd...kiss you goodbye but...I think we both know I wouldn't leave after." He admits, his confidences rising as his jaw flexes to solidly the point.

She smirks, her lips opening into a knowing smile then. "If you kissed me, I'd probably drag you to my bed like a cavewoman before you could even consider leaving." She admits with a sigh.

He chuckles then, something painful and bittersweet. " _I should_ …" He offers, indicating the door.

"Yeah."

"I'll see you tomorrow?" He asks, a self-loathing hopefulness in his tone.

"Of course." She nods, following him to the door.

" _Hey_ ," He says, turning to her. "No hiding. NO avoiding."

She rolls her eyes, like a little girl being told off by her father. "Goodnight Harvey." She sing-songs.

"Goodnight Donna." He says, taking one last look of her before he turns his back.

. . ...

 ** _It shouldn't need to be so fucking hard_**

 ** _This is life on earth_**

 ** _It's just life on earth_**

 ** _It doesn't need to be the end of you, or me_**

 ** _This is life on earth_**

 ** _It's just life on earth_**

 _'Life on Earth' By Snow Patrol_

. . …

Please feed the kitty! This is familar, but hopefully this will go in some new direction from here.


	4. Chapter 4

***BETA'D as OF 26.07.18 (I said I'd post again tonight, but I am so incredibly tired. This needed to be worked over beforehand) A xx

 _ **Author's Notes:**_

 _Well Done to the anon who pointed out that we didn't see how Donna got back into her apartment. I actually assumed myself that she went to Louis after Harvey, but if you go back to Chapter 2 it's been edited to include this. Thanks Anon! #youguysmakemebetter_

 _After AK's Q &A, Doing another double post. The other chapter will be out tomorrow!_

 _. ..._

Chapter 4

. . …

 _ **Everybody wants to go to Heaven  
First you gotta pass  
And I ain't ready for that**_

 _ **Everybody wants to go to Heaven  
No one wants to die**_

 _ **What if Heaven's right here?**_

' _Heaven' By Nick Hakim_

. . ...

Donna Paulsen wakes into the morning with a strangeness, with a lightness and a confusion about the night before.

 _Harvey kissed her._

Paula is pregnant.

Harvey…. _kissed her_...and wanted to stay.

 _Paula is..._

She groans, stretching out of the bed, her head pounding with a dullness from the wine that she had finished off after Harvey had left her. After she'd asked for him to go home. To give her space. To allow her to gather herself.

Twelve hours later and she's beginning to regret it; the crystal clear memory of yesterday, of his lips against hers; his unfiltered need of her, now playing in the back of her mind like a trailer to a movie that isn't even out yet.

The way his hands, so strong and seeming so sure as they held her. His lips, so charmingly crooked against hers, sucking at her mouth in a way that could get her to do or say anything that he asked for. _Not that she would ever tell him that._ It had taken all of her will power to remove herself from his embrace, stopping the act dead, before she truly succumbed to her own urges. She's a woman, after all, and one that's been lacking in that department, of late. Ever since she kissed him she's been wanting to suck at the corner of his jaw, and dig her fingers into his shoulders and taste every single hidden corner of him that she can name form memory.

So sickening, to think that what they have, can only exist alongside complete chaos...

All those years, when he dated casually, with moral abandon and self indulgence, she never so much as batted an eyelid. Because, at least they were a team still, and nothing could come between them whilst they were that. All those years that he hadn't spoken to his Mother, living with scar upon scar, that would inevitably mould him into never being able to keep a relationship. She wonders if she and Lilly are really all that different.

With the era of Mike Ross gone, it seems to bring so many things with it in its wake. So many changes, so many developments, as far as she and Harvey are concerned. He and Rachel only accentuated things that were already there.

It's apparent, then.

 _She and Harvey have been in limbo for over a decade._

She didn't understand what kind, until now.

She dresses for herself today, putting out of her mind the kind of things that she knows Harvey likes to see on a woman.

He's always loved her red hair and her long legs, once commenting on Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, being the quintessential figure of beauty. Luckily they are two things that she need not attend to today, with legs silky soft and hair washed the day before yesterday. She opens her closet before she's even stepped in the shower, the thought of being prepared for this Tuesday above all others, calms the inner turmoil threatening to take her down a notch.

She's gathering quite a collection of dresses, since her promotion. With a bigger paycheck every month, the opportunities and extra cash flow have awakened the kind of looks that border more on Jessica's image than her own one. There are less of the neat asymmetrical designs, and the digitally printed ensembles that she wore as an unstoppable Assistant, and as her general image morphs into that that of a key member of Management, she's starting to develop herself even further. She is a professional peacekeeper, and with Harvey now stepping down and falling back into a previous position, she's sure that he's bound to ruffle more feathers than he was ever able to as Managing Partner. Therefore she must appear direct, strong, yet inclusive and amenable in her position as the firm's Chief Operating Officer.

 _No matter what is going on between them._

 _No matter what the firm becomes._

And there is no better work-fashion role model to help her exude power, professionalism and sharp style, than the woman who held this firm together since her arrival, and probably even before then.

She passes past a few options; an Oscar de la Renta scarlett gown with gold embellishment; a Givenchy monochrome cape gown and an Alexander Mcqueen tartan number; a small selection of the fifty or so dresses that she's gathering in her quickly burgeoning collection.

 _One more dress and she'll need to remodel her apartment just to keep up..._

Her fingers continue to slide through the rack, landing on a Roland Mouret sheath dress, with a tartan skirt and a long zip up the back; dramatic sleeves framing her form. It's something formal and presentable, with nothing whatsoever of ' _Harvey Specter kissed me last night_ ' about it.

This is her armour for the day.

To ward off any problems that the world could offer.

 _Such a shame, that life is not yet that simple, in kind._

. . ….

 _ **Let me back it up to the start of the climb**_

 _ **Faced with an army of vipers and lions**_

 _ **I had to keep on reaching up 'cause it was my time**_

 _ **To tear down the kingdom and call out the liars**_

 _ **Got a jail on my heart from the pessimists**_

 _ **Got those nails in my mouth for impressionists**_

 _ **Spent too much money on a therapist**_

 _ **Couldn't fix me, I accepted it**_

' _Gladiator' By Zayde Wolf_

. . ….

Harvey rises with an overly alert spring in his step.

Something in his life has changed. The pressure from behind his eyes has lessened. The tiredness in his bones seems a little less today than it has in over a year. Maybe two, if he's honest with himself.

He...kissed Donna. Him. He... _Harvey Reginald Specter_ ….took a risk. And it _almost_ paid off. He smirks to himself, sipping at his steaming cup of coffee. He's too old and tired to get mad about her asking for space. He kind of understands. His timing couldn't have been worse, but honestly, he's feeling flippant these days. He's growing impatient of the fact that she is there, beside him with a quiet stoicism, right there, so close to touch but never to have.

The dreams have started again. She's becoming a main feature in his evenings, swathed in his sheets and lit by the morning sun, offering him ultimatums for him to keep her in his bed. The first time it was that she wasn't coming with him to the firm. The next time, it was that she wasn't come back, after being fired. The third time, was that she was going to work for Louis. And the fourth time was that she wasn't his Assistant anymore. Every time that he dreams of her, in this scenario, waking up with him, so soft and fantasy-ridden, explaining in each of these moments that she has been ripped from him. Every time he finds himself, more complacent about it. As if, his mind is working out that she always manages to stay, no matter what happens with or indeed around them. No matter the fault, or the tear that they go through, she is there, in his bed, with a divine purpose.

Last night...he dreamt of her...pregnant. _For a split second it was jarring, as if she wasn't herself, her face glitching in the sunlight between orange hair and gold. He had squinted into the morning light, trying to pick out parts he'd already seen; until she had appeared, bathed in white and grinning as she almost waddled into his bedroom, a cup in each hand, a repeat performance of his past with an added twist. He remembers making a joke about her not being able to see her feet, followed by a strict warning against her tripping on his polished flooring, more for the baby than anything. He also remembers her colourful language in response and an accusation about him impregnating her, before she slides the cups onto his bedside table. But, coffee is the last thing on his mind, as he gets up, moulding to her back, and wrapping his arms around her swollen belly, his heart skipping at the two heartbeats beneath his fingers._

When had woken in the morning, he realised something new.

Donna Paulsen, may potentially be the one for him.

He never believed in such things before. But the world seems bent on showing her to him. On allowing him to keep her.

And he thinks that maybe...just maybe...he's the one for her.

And no matter what responsibilities were about to fall into this lap. No matter the personal difficulties that he may encounter, and have to navigate with regards to Paula,

Above it all,

He wants more with Donna Paulsen.

So, whilst the doubt continues to circles them, and even despite it all, he needs, nay, longs to keep her incredibly close.

 **This has now stopped being about work**. **About the kind of Lawyer he wants to be.**

 _It's about the kind of man that she makes him,_

 _And the kind of man that he wants to be,_

 _For her, and her alone._

. . . ...

Pursuant to last nights request, he doesn't bother her in the morning, refraining from seeking her out in her office. Definitely not before lunch. In all honesty he's afraid that if he sees her, Chanel clad and Louboutin healed, hell, even in sweats, that it'll invoke such a memory of the night before, that he'd stride across her office and devour her, or propose to her, or something far more stupid to ruin them.

He's always been attracted to Donna Paulsen. He was from the very beginning, since she had accosted him with a proposal, all ginger bangs and wool covered. but after lines were crossed and rules were made and barriers were erected, it created the kind of distance where he couldn't really focus on her appearance anymore. She was beautiful, and that was that, and it was all firmly out of his mind. That is, until Stephen _Murderer_ Huntley walked into his office and got his dick out for her, and only then, only under duress, did he finally allowed himself to acknowledge the fact that she had been this beautiful woman, sat outside his office for over a decade. A woman, that until that point, in _his_ head had, been turned into some kind of desexualised religious statue.

 _To be worshipped but never ever touched._

And then, she had kissed him and suddenly it was like tasting malt whiskey for the first time; it's intoxicating mix of headyness and vibrancy that left his insides a flash of warm and smokey onto ice cold and his heart beating faster with every lingering touch.

Now he's in this place where, if he's honest with himself...he can't _stop_ thinking about her. And then he's reminded again, rather jarringly, of the baby that Paula is carrying, and it's _so far_ , uncertain future, and then, he feels the need to dig a hole to bury himself him. But guilt itself fills the hole just as quick, all roads pulling him away from his impulses to seek Donna out - like the need has been written in his D.N.A. from day one, to find her and claim her as his - are dredged from his mind.

He leaves the office early, diving into a schedule that fills up his day right up to lunchtime.

As he's walking down Trinity Place, _a small break in between meetings_ , he receives a call, fishing his phone out of his back pocket, his eyes spying the caller id with a meaningful smirk as he slides the receiver it against his ear.

" _Well if it isn't that loser I used to know_ ," He remarks.

"Is that how you're spelling 'the world's best closer' these days?" Ask the voice. "For you, Old Man, it's just Mike Ross." He offers.

 _His words sting a little, even though he knows Mike doesn't mean it._

It doesn't however, stop him from tearing him a new one.

" _ **Old Man**_?" He repeats, indignance in his voice and a pause in his step. "You really think just because you're three thousand miles away, you can say that to me?" He accuses. " _Sounds like the great Mike Ross is looking to get his ass kicked_ …" He jests.

He hears Mike chuckle on the other end. "How's it going? Any news in the world of Harvey Specter?" He hears Mike ask.

The penny drops then. He rolls his eyes lavishly, looking towards the receiver. _Mike never was subtle._

"Let me guess... _you spoke to Donna_." He supposes, his voice landing with a thud.

"What makes you say that?" He hears Mike ask, a notable smile in his voice.

" _Because_ ," He starts," in the few years that we worked together, you've hardly ever called me to just 'chew the fat'." He observes, smirking at the magnitude of his own rightness.

"Well that's because you used to called _me_ , and bark orders down the phone." Mike reminds him.

He smirks. _….Little smartass..._

"So. I heard you knocked up your ex." Mike says then.

His face drops, shaking his head at the kids gussy. _Some things never change._ " _Too soon_?" Mike offers, filling the silence.

"Thanks, _Asshole_." He chides. "I'm already dick deep in this mess...now I've got you rubbing salt in the wound, too?" He offers, a colourful groan on his lips.

"Wow...mixed metaphors…" Mike quips. "Sounds like someone's in desperate need for a little break." Mike sing-songs.

"I'm thinking about breaking my foot in your ass. _Does that count_?" Harvey remarks heavily, all sharp edges.

"Seriously though...how you holding up?" Mike asks, his gussy lessening.

"The Truth? I'm...still...waiting for an answer." He says heavily, sighing at the weight of having to have this conversation with another person this week. _That's three down..._

"So, Paula's working out how best to screw up your life, huh?" Mike offers, a slight cheekiness in his tone.

"So you _did_ speak to Donna?" He supposes, smirking widely.

 _He's never going to be able to stop the line of information in his life. Donna tells Rachel. Rachel Tells Mike. Mike tells him. He talks to Donna. The cycle is neverending._

"You know, this conversation has only run for," Mike pauses. "One minute and eight seconds, and yet you've already managed to mention Donna twice in that very short amount of time." He points out. "I think _someone_ has _a crush_." He plays.

"If this is you calling me to make me feel better, you're doing a really shitty job." Harvey counters, irksome then.

"Okay, I'm sorry. I'll stop." Mike relinquishes then, calming his verbal assault. "There was actually _a reason_ for my call."

"More than just giving me shit?" Harvey offers.

"Yeah...I actually called to...invite you...to the city." He says.

"I think you missed the memo, Mike. I'm already _in_ the city." He tells the young man, arrogance riding each step he takes along the busy sidewalk.

It's not been lost on Mike Ross, or for that matter anyone who know him, that Harvey Specter considers New York to be the only city in the world.

In Harvey Specter's eyes, not even London or Paris take the top spot.

He is a man of the city of New York. He breathes, sleeps and eats The Big Apple.

"Funny," Mike remarks sarcastically. "Rach and I just bought a house, and I figure the two of you, could-"

"' _The two of us'_?" Harvey repeats, frowning into the receiver.

"I just thought that...you and Donna...might need to get away for a few days."

"Mike…" He says, sighing heavily. He's already talked himself out of rushing things with Donna. He doesn't want to have to explain to Mike, to, what an awful idea that would be. It's then, in the small moment of silence that he deduces something. "Wait...you...need help with a case don't you?" He accuses suddenly.

"...No." Mike says, a broad pauses falling after his reply.

" _You do_...I can feel it." He says, holding firm on his hunch.

" ** _I do not_**...and I am hurt, that you think I would only invite you here to help me,"

"Cut the crap, Mike." He bites, good-naturedly.

"Okay...I could do with a _second opinion_. Maybe. But...the offer is genuine. Bring Donna. We've both missed her."

"But not me, huh?" He remarks, only half a joke in his words.

"I'm serious." Mike says, earnest framing his words. "We'll take you round the city, see the sights. It'll be good for both of you both to get away." He reasons.

"Mike, I don't know what kind of hearts-and-flowers justice system they have in Seattle, but here in _the city_ , we actually embrace the full work week." He says, ignoring Mike's strangled sigh.

"Harvey...neither you _or_ Donna have had a vacation since I've known you both." He points out. "And according to Rach, she's only seen Donna go on vacation once since she's known her, and that was because _you_ had the flu." He notes. "Just...get on a plane with her and come have dinner with us." He presses.

 _It does sound tempting..._

Whether Donna would go for it or not, he's not entirely sure. For all he knows, she wants to run to the hills, as opposed to sit with him on a plane headed west.

But there is something appealing in getting out of the city for a couple of days. In taking her away from the situation at hand. And with the way his career is going, backwards seeming, rather than forwards.

It could be good to just... _get away for a while._

"So…." He hears Mike press his nerve on the other end of the phone.

He sighs then, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"This is _not_ a yes...so tell your wife _not_ to spill it to her best friend before I've made my decision." He warns good naturedly.

" _Who do you think suggested it in the first place_ ," He hears the young man reply, his words sending a tiredness into his own bones.

" _You realise_ you're both perfect for one another," He notes, more accusation than compliment in his voice.

"Let me know when you arrive…" Mike says. "We'll lock the door." He adds, cheekily.

" ** _Bye Dickhead_**." He replies, promptly ending the call.

The idea lingers on his mind into lunch, teetering on the apex between a yes, and a no.

No matter his answer, it all hinges on one very complicated woman.

And what she thinks about it.

. . …

 _ **Sleep my darling**_

 _ **I don't wanna wake you**_

 _ **I'll see you again**_

 _ **Sleep my dear**_

 _ **I hope you treat me sweetly**_

 _ **But I'll be gone before you wake up**_

 _ **I won't talk much,**_

 _ **Won't try to make the bed out**_

 _ **I think I did it now,**_

 _ **I won't leave my trail, you'll never find me**_

 _ **You belong behind me**_

 _ **Sleep my dear,**_

 _ **Hope you treat me sweetly**_

 _ **But I'll be gone before you wake up,**_

 _ **Before you wake up**_

'Sleep' By Nick Hakim

. . ...

Donna Paulsen is in a slight daze, falling into her morning routine until lunch just about rounds the corner. She is walking towards her office, a dozen or so copies, charting a new office protocol in her hands when she notices a small woman outside Robert's office, the door firmly closed.

Donna halts sharply, all blood draining from her face as she works out the image in front of her. She feels her heartbeat quicken in her chest, the adrenaline coursing through her.

 _It's too late to turn back now_ , she thinks, as she recognises her, a look of confusion the other woman's face as she two spots her.

 _The other woman, indeed..._

It's only been a month or so since she's seen Paula Agard.

"Donna…" Paula begins, holding her bag a little tighter to herself than when she had first spotted her.

She watches as the woman regards her with a pin sharp scrutiny. It's in that moment that she's suddenly grateful that she made an effort today, with her impeccable dress sense and high than necessary heels.

She reminds herself then... _There isn't anything that this woman can take away from her that she herself hasn't already played out in her mind first._

"Is this not Harvey's office?" She asks, pointing to Robert's Office.

 _She looks...dowdy._ More so than usual, in a shapeless sweater and pale cream trousers with a crease down the middle of them.

This is the woman who has potentially broken any hope of a simple happiness for her and Harvey. Who, in the process of reappearing in his life, is on the cusp of changing the course of hers too, and altering it immeasurably.

"No... _He's_ …" She wants to withhold information from the woman. _It's none of her business._ Except she's looking at the glass door with a perceptive stare, and that means that she's taken in that Robert Zane is now Managing Partner. "Stepped down. You'll find him in his old office." She says, her tone deliberately neutral.

"Oh." Paula replies, gathering herself in thought. "I called Mike, but he didn't answer." She explains, half to herself.

It riles her to think that she even has Mike's number. Mike Ross is hers, and Harvey's and Rachel's, but certainly not Paula Agards'.

"Mike doesn't work here anymore, Paula." She says, refusing to divulge any further. "Didn't Harvey tell you?" She offers, internally relishing in the feeling of the words as they slide off of a tongue that was very much recently in said man's mouth.

She watches as Paula frowns deeply, before covering the emotion with a blankness.

"No. He didn't…" She shrugs. "Do you know...is Harvey's in his office?" She asks then, looking past her and down the hall.

It dawns on her, that Paula Agard is either incredibly conniving, or fantastically stupid, to ask her, of all people for assistance.

 _She's not sure if she's just as stupid, for bending to the woman's whim so easily._

 ** _Kill them with kindness, her Grandmother used to say..._**

"I think, if memory serves, he's out at the moment." She says.

Paula's eyes narrow then, judging her words. "Right." She responds.

She's just about to turn around in the opposite direction and abandon her original destination when Paula verbally reaches out to her.

"Donna...I hope you know that I... _I didn't plan for any of this_ -"

"Let's just…" She starts, slicing through the woman's soft sounding words like she's a hot poker sliding slowly through the ice, the hand that's not holding the files coming out to silence her, a motion to stop in her flattened hand standing upright between them. " _Cut the crap_ , Paula." She says, sounding like Harvey in the moment. "Harvey might have fallen for it...but I, don't believe a single word that comes out of your mouth." She says icily.

" ** _Excuse me_**?" Paula frowns, her eyes sharpening into slightly interested glare.

"You heard me." She says boldly. "I've spent far too long, having to keep my thoughts to myself, where _you_ are concerned." She says, making to turn again. Before she can Paula steps towards her, her head bending to meet her eyes with a sharpness.

"Uh, Donna, I...think you're forgetting that _you're_ the reason that we split up in the first place." Paula counters, folding her arms.

"And I think that _you're forgetting_ I'm the only reason you ever _met_ him...in the first place." She counters, a snap, a crack and a slash to her words.

She's done being kind. She's been reserved, and contained and had to put up with this woman's inappropriate behaviour before, because she held a kind of status. She _had_ had a position in Harvey's life, that Donna couldn't overstep at the time. But those days were over - _for the immediate future, at least_ \- and now she's just another woman of his past coming back to haunt them both.

She takes a step towards the smaller woman, one carefully healed foot ahead of the other. "Did you even take a second, during those sessions...even after I came to see you, to consider that perhaps it was best not to involve yourself in Harvey's personal life? No matter what he said?" She asks sharply, her tone enticing an answer in record time.

"Wait a second." Paula says, her pointed finger lashing out into the space between them. "If I remember correctly, _Harvey_ asked _me_ out. I didn't go to him." She clarifies.

" _Women like you never do_." Donna plants the words, the confidence of her own beliefs giving her an internal strength. She takes a step towards the woman, making sure she's as tall and commanding as she'll ever be. " _Now_ ," She starts, "We can go on, and pretend that this is just some _accident_." She offers, candidly. "That you didn't _mean_ to get pregnant, or that perhaps you just really wanted a baby after all these years, and Harvey is _of course_ , a worthy chance of that happening. The perfect candidate, even." She reasons. "But I'll bet it's _...more_ than that." She muses. "You saw him...saw the kind of man that he is, _inside_. The real him, the one that he doesn't often let the rest of the world see, and you figured that...you could fill that place... _my_ place, in his life, and maybe also take a little something for yourself as well." She deduces finally, before straightening once more.

She watches the other woman blink several times, her large pale blue eyes sharpened like daggers.

"I'm not going to stand here and let you character assassinate me," Paula says, outrage riding her face as she looks about them both for witnesses.

"Then by all means, Paula, I'll gladly ask security to escort you out of my firm," She offers sweetly, standing by her guns.

The woman swallows, and she can see for a split second that this conversation is coming to an end.

"If you think that staying by his side will eventually make him realise that he wants you, then I'm afraid you're even more delusional than I first thought." Paula says, throwing the words at the redhead.

Donna laughs to herself, one short nasal sputter, something dry and dead and unaffected by the small woman standing opposite her.

" _Oh Paula_ …" She says, an unfiltered pity in her words. "Harvey _wanting me_ has never been the issue." She says, smirking smugly. "But I'll guess that you didn't even look into our past long enough to figure that out, until you decided to get your claws into him."

 _It's enough. She's had enough now._ She can feel herself slipping. She's getting too personal, like a woman affected by another woman. Paula Agard is a harpy. The worst representation of a therapist and a human being and a woman. But she doesn't need to stoop so low. She's had her moment.

Harvey wouldn't want her going any further than this.

"Like I said," Donna says, breaking their short yet awkward silence. "He's not here right now. So, if you need to talk to him, _call him_." She flicks the last of the words over her shoulder, paying no more mind to Paula Agard, as she turns on loftily her heel, gliding with unscripted purpose down the hallway, away from her office and the woman lingering outside it.

She breathes small sigh of relief soon after she's fled the scene.

 _That felt good_ , she thinks to herself,

Finally getting the chance to let Paula Agard know,

That where Harvey Specter is concerned,

 ** _Donna Paulsen isn't going anywhere, any time soon._**

. . . ...


	5. Chapter 5

**_Author's Notes:_**

 _Hey Suitors! Sorry for delay my life has been less than helpful!_

 _So, some people thought that Donna's response was a little O.O.C. (Haa, C.O.O. Backwards!) Firsty, always welcome opinions._

 _For me, I feel like, after all that Paula has done to distance Harvey from Donna, and after Donna has pleaded to the woman to keep her job, and even gone to her before Harvey even dated her to point out the tenaciousness of their long and complicated relationship - in my mind was more a motive than her looking for him, it was a point to find out from Paula if Harvey was discussing her in the sessions - I feel that she would have this slip, of being rather coarse and frank with Paula. She wasn't able to tell Paula what she thought of her, when she was Harvey's therapist, because she thought she was helping him. And then, once Paula was dating Harvey again, again she couldn't say. She couldn't drop a Donna bomb, which she does with everyone. None of us thought that she would ever kiss him when he was with someone else, but she did. I also never thought she'd slap Hardman, but she did. And we never thought she'd go through with meeting Mark at that Hotel, and if it hadn't been for Rachel, she would have. She also went back on her rule after 10 years to date a guy a the office, and pressed Harvey about it._

 _Donna doesn't always do the right thing when it comes to Harvey. She does the right thing **for** him, and on behalf of him, with work and his family. But when it comes to her, when her own heart is involved, she tends to push or slash or be inconsistent and force it with him because of his inactivity. _

_Now I understand, that Paula might not want Donna around if she couldn't swear to never ever kiss Harvey again. So, I dabbled with her testing the waters gently, but then I figured. Hey, Harvey's just kissed her. It's the perfect time for her to give the woman a piece of her mind, before things get more complicated. Before the waters are potentially muddied past the point that she even has a say. So for that reason, and fear, I feel like she would rip at Paula. Three/Four months of underhanded comments and being forced out of a man's life - a man who she is potentially in love with - might just give her that edge._

 _Call me cruel or call Donna OCC but that's my two cents._

 _And no. I don't like Paula lol. Amazing Season 5 Paula died and I can't ever revive her no matter how much I wanted to. Thanks Korsh! :narrows eyes:_

 _So, here's chapter 5 ;-)_

 _A xox_

. . ….

 **Chapter 5**

. . … .

The moment that the adrenaline which had flooded her body with a vengeance begins to settle,

 _That's when the guilt sets in._

She's not that kind of woman.

And no matter what has come before, she is in a different position now.

She and Harvey are in a different position than they were when she had kissed him.

And for that reason, and that reason alone, she decides to make a promise to herself.

That she'll be impartial now. Paula deserves that much, at least.

She leaves soon after the altercation, for a longer than long lunch, hoping that the woman will be gone by the time she gets back.

She dashes all remaining thought with a glass of chardonnay, a small luxury that she has bestowed on herself, and texts Harvey the bare bones, earning a string of broken thoughts from him relating to Paula's unscripted cameo. She doesn't mention the altercation, figuring that if Paula tells him, and he's not happy with her, that he'll be straight onto his cell with her number in mind and a few words not too far behind that.

She drags her fork through her mountain of Caprese salad, the mozzarella snailing it's way around her plate on a bed of basil.

Her gaze flicks to her cell phone, a thought fleeting through her mind.

She's sure she's too busy to answer.

A stoney weight falls into her stomach. Another ache at her absence.

She's never missed a friend quite like she misses Rachel Zane.

Her eyes dart back to her cell phone, the impulse rising higher.

She sighs, almost defeated as she speed dials the number.

"Well well, aren't I the lucky recipient." Rachel's voice chimes on the other lunch.

"Hey girl face. You don't perhaps have ten minutes to spare for a dear friend and questionable human being."

"I'm actually on my way to court, so I have about fifteen...wait... _what happened_?"

She frowns, noticing something strange in her tone. "Wait a second….do you know what I'm gonna say?" She enquires, interest filtering out of her words.

She hears Rachel clear her throat on the other end. "That would depend...on what you would say."

 _She remembers those words coming from her own mouth a long time ago...the recipiant being very different._

"Rachel?" She pressures, a slightly mothering tone.

"Donna?" Rachel counters.

She purses her lips. _Rachel's learning from Mike._ She sighs then, her free hand coming up to trace the edge of her half empty glass.

"Paula showed up at the office today." She relents.

"Oh no...and?"

"I was... _less than cordial_."

"What did you say to her?" Rachel asks, interested unbridled and rather cheeky in her voice.

"I guess the real question is what _didn't_ I say to her?" Donna jokes, rolling her eyes.

"Oh god?" She hears Rachel verbally cringe on the other end of the phone. "How bad are we talking?"

"Try _Mean Girls_ , with a dash of Pretty Woman, only, now I can't remember whether I was Regina George, Julia Roberts or the snooty saleswoman."

"You've seen Mean Girls?" Rachel asks.

"Who hasn't, Rachel?" She admonishes with a playful tone. "But that's not the point…" She says, her voice sobering. "I was mean. I was cruel, and for the first time I actually cut her down to size."

"Did it...feel good?"

"You're not helping." She groans. "But yes, for exactly sixteen seconds before the wave of guilt set in, it...felt..great." She admits with a disappointed sigh.

"Donna...I know that you pride yourself on your generosity and your kindness."

"It _is_ the Fifth commandment in the _Book of Donna_ ," She reminds her friend.

"Paula Agard didn't extend you the same courtesy." She notes. "And honestly, if it had been me….and Mike with another woman, I would have been...just as conflicted."

"I miss you." She admits, picking up her fork to ease the need to fidget.

"I miss you too!" Rachel peels on the other end. "You need to visit. _And soon_. I need some Donna in my life."

"Judging by this week, you're not the only one." She remarks, smiling wryly.

"You wouldn't perhaps be referring to a certain lawyer with a rather surly demeanour and a penchant for whiskey and a sharp suit?"

"So that's what we're calling Harvey these days." She jokes.

"Did something happen with you two?" Rachel asks after a beat.

"He...kissed me."

"Finally."

"Not helping, Rach. He might be having a child with his ex."

"And you're now worried, if he's kissing you _but having a baby with her_ …"

"Dare you feel the need to even finish that sentence?"

"Donna...don't let this situation with Paula ruin what you and Harvey have." She tells the older woman. "I feel it, right in my gut that you two are just...you're meant to be together. You're soulmates. There's a reason he chose you, and it has exactly nothing to do with you wanting to keep your job."

She sighs. "Rachel...I know that you're looking at the carbon copy for reference but...sometimes...soulmates don't end up together."

"Look...trust me. Or at the very least, trust him." She says. "And keep that in mind. No matter _what_ happens." She says.

Donna frowns then. _More information out of context._ Her thought is disrupted when she hears a lock disengage then, and a flood of background sound from the other side of the call.

"I have to go, but keep me posted?" Rachel offers, a rustling sound folding on around her voice.

"Oh Rach….come rain or shine I'll be sure to keep you in the loop. Good luck in court."

"Bye."

. . . . …

 _Pour another glass of her warm smoke_

 _Into the river and let it rest_

 _'Til my thoughts get weary, until they float_

 _I feel the smoke rising, heart in my throat_

 _Pour another glass of her warm smoke_

 _Until I sleepwalk back home_

 _With the stench of her perfume all on my coat_

 _And yet another morning, I wake and I'm alone_

' _Pour Another' By Nick Hakim_

. . ….

When Donna rounds the corner to her office, lighter and pepped and feeling more like herself, she sees him standing in his usual spot, looking stoic, staring out the window with the kind of patience that she thinks he only reserves for less than a handful of people in his life.

 _Her._

 _Mike._

 _And Jessica._

He seems to hear her heels, turning on his own sole to face her.

" _Hey_ ," He says, his jaw twitching with a subtext to it.

"Hey." She greets, feeling shy all of a sudden. "Did you get a chance to speak to Paula?" She asks, trying with all her might to keep the lightness in her voice and the topic away from them.

"No…" He says, his face falling slightly, giving rise to an intuition that he isn't here to talk about his ex. "She text...said she had a meeting and that she couldn't stay." He explains, his hands sliding out of his pockets.

"Well...she sure stayed long enough to meet me, outside _my_ office," She says, more of an aside than she'd meant it to be, as she places her purse on the little meeting table next to her desk.

"What do you mean? _What happened_?" He asks, his head tilting at her, his expression expectant of an answer.

 _She can't resist that look. It's the look they give one another when they know the other is bullshitting, and badly so._

She sighs then, slumping slightly in her four thousand dollar dress and two hundred dollar heels. It turns out, _money doesn't make your troubles go awa_ y... "When she came to see you today, at _your old_ office, she was of course standing outside _my_ office...wondering where _yours_ was." She explains, a knowing gaze as she walks over to her desk.

"Ah..and what did she say?" He asks.

"Harvey, I don't want to get in between the two of you," She warns.

" _Donna._ " He says, dropping her name into the air like a weight in water.

"Fine... _you really want to know_?" She offers, feeling tired then at having to relive it.

"I wouldn't be asking, if I didn't." He says solidly.

"She said... just the right thing to rile me up enough to give her….a rather _large_ piece of my mind." She sighs heavily, feeling lesser than. Her eyes slide to his, afraid of seeing his reaction, until she spies it as only half the reprimand she assumed it would be. "See it as the only time I get to stick it to the woman before she ensconces herself in your life for good." She adds.

His eyes widen then. "Does that mean that she's going to…?"

"No, No, She didn't.." She says, hurriedly. "You weren't here. I told her to call you." She explains. "It wasn't my best moment. I'm...sorry...for making things complicated."

He nods, pursing his lips as he glances out the window, taking in the information. After a small silence, he turns to her, unlike his usual held manner. "It's okay. I did that...a long time ago." He says, something sombre in his voice as he looks onto the view. She waits for a moment, not wanting to crowd his thoughts.

"I'm sorry...that she's bothering you." He says meaningfully. "I'll talk to her." He offers.

"When... _are_ ….you talking to her?" She asks, sidestepping his offer.

"Saturday," He answers.

"Right…." She sighs, dropping her shoulders and looking down at her desk, watching out of the corner of her eye as he wanders towards the door.

Just when she thinks he's leaving, he turns on his heel, betraying his natural rhythm and his penchant for dancing shoes.

"Let's go away."

Her eyes flick up to his, wider than usual, confusion hanging soberly in them.

"What?" She frowns, taking in his words as if they're on a loop in her head.

"For a few days. Let's just...get out of here." He offers.

Her face drops then, her hands automatically flicking the backrest on her laptop to allow it to perch expertly on it's case's hinge. "Harvey, _we have work_ ," She gestures animatedly to her desk. "We can't just... _go_ on vacation." She scoffs, looking at him with a matter of factness.

His hands slide back into his pockets. "Sure we can." He shrugs. We both have more than enough days held back." He reminds her. "Robert's here; he's taking the helm." He offers, taking a step towards her. "I don't have any cases right now...what a better way for me to relinquish control than to let Louis and Robert fight it out between them, whilst I...relax for a couple of days," He smirks.

"Harvey…" She says, her tone like a deadlock within the situation. "Regardless. I'm C.O.O." She states. "I need to file for that kind of time."

" _Donna_ …" He says, a solidness to his tone. "Robert knows you deserve the time. He's been privy to everything that has gone on here, and let's face it. There's a been a lot of changes over the last few years." He reasons. "We could... _go to Seattle_. Go shopping, take in the sights, have dinner with Mike and Rach, and be back before the end of the week."

"So you're just going to leave the Mother of your child here to just... _go it alone_?" She throws at him.

He frowns, his chest broadening at the sudden accusation.

"Donna, that's not what I'm saying." He defends. "And why are you defending her, when not five minutes ago you were telling me she was giving you a hard time?"

"It just sounds very much like you're becoming one of _those_ kinds of guys, who just found out that he got an ex pregnant and is running from their problems, all whilst dragging _me_ along for the ride."

His gaze sharpens, his chest broadening. "Are you seriously trying to insinuate that I'd run out on Paula?" He questions, his jaw setting with a distaste.

"Well, if the shoe fits, Harvey." She throws at him.

She watches as he blinks several times. He'd usually hit the roof at this point, and right now she can't really understand why that's not happening. It's only then that she acknowledges that perhaps she's throwing this all in motion, this perfect spanner in the works, to deflect away from his suggestion.

And that maybe, just maybe, _he's hip to the squid..._

"Hey. Look. I didn't plan this. _Any of this_." He says, his words heavy in their application as he steps towards her. "But...I can see that it's bothering you, her coming here, and involving you, so forgive me, for thinking that whisking you away from it all for a couple of days to catch up with our friends, and gain a little common ground is such a bad idea…"

"You shouldn't have kissed me." She says, the words hanging like a dead weight between them.

For a second it stalls him, he eyes flicking to her lips, before he meet her eyes.

He sighs. " _I know_. But…"

"Harvey…"

"Donna.. _I wanted to_."

"Harvey." She sighs, frowning heavily.

"Look...Forget it." He shrugs, playing a non-chalant. "Stupid idea." He mutters.

He turns on his heel then. It's unlike him to be like this. True, he turned up at her door to take her to breakfast, and for an impromptu shopping excursion. And sure, he's appeared in moments of their past without an invitation. _Okay...maybe this is a habit that he's built on with her over the years, and she's only just starting to realise the fact…_

 _Now...she feels like a prized asshole in the face of his kind of reasonable idea._

 _What does she think is going to happen?_

 _Possibly something starting with 'heart', and ending in a hard 'break'..._

 _It's the first time she's ever said no to him, with regards to something like this._

 _She'll have to add this to the time that he asked her to come back to his desk, as one of two times she has ever denied him._

"Harvey," She says, catching him before he's rounded the corner of the glass walls.

"What," He huffs, his trademark irritability peeking out, as he flares his nostrils, turning to look expectedly at her.

 _He's rather cute when he's insistent,_ she realises. "What time?" She says, a faked irritability in her question, to offset the nervousness writhing unnaturally within her.

"I'll...pick you up at 7pm." He says, pointedly, all annoyance abating soon after.

She smiles to herself. _Of course. Everything in Harvey's evening happens at seven. The flight could be at eleven, but sure, seven._ If she weren't invisiging dinner with him beforehand, or a quick burger at a joint somewhere then she would have enquired. But time with Harvey is like that sometimes, on those very rare occasions where he just disconnects from the world, with a man like that, you just have to pull up anchor and let them sail towards something...

"I'll let Robert know." She nods. "Do you want me to book the flights?" She offers.

 _She barely does anything for him anymore._

Sometimes she wonders if he has trouble letting her go. If maybe these past few days are just a mutated reaction to that.

Occasionally, she too has trouble not being in charge of the inner workings of his day.

"No, I got it." He shrugs casually.

" _ **Really**_?" She challenges, her voice a mixture of colours and insinuations. "You sure about that?" She offers.

He rolls his eyes, making for the exit and withholding any smarmy reply he may have had.

"Harvey…" She calls, a delicately laid question on her tongue. She watches as he turns, looking to her with a softness. "Are you going to tell Paula?" She asks.

He face falls, his jaw tightening in some sort of thought that she can't quite identify. "Donna, she is _not_ my girlfriend anymore. And if she asks, I've had to go to Chicago for work." He reasons coolly.

She nods then, watching as he saunters out of the office, his eyes dragging away from hers as a notable swagger unfolds in his gait.

She dashes thoughts of Paula out of her mind. She is not her first consideration.

She shakes her head then, stretching for her cellphone, and that little number that's come in so handy over the years.

She needs two dresses. _Stat_. And one back up. And she needs to leave work early today.

To pack.

For her strange date-like-vacation with her Ex-boss. Ex-one-time-lay. Her….

 _Harvey._

. . …

 _ **Just lift me up from here**_

 _ **I said I don't want the day to go**_

 _ **What will tomorrow be**_

 _ **And you shine you light on me**_

 _ **You shine you light on me**_

'Lift Me Up' By Nick Hakim

. . ….

She's not asked for a thing from Robert Zane, and so far, she's matching up well as a number two, after an honorable mention from her best friend, his daughter and fellow Lawyer. Robert seems to understand her motives so far, and knows that she can change Harvey's mind on the head of a dime. Therefore, given that it's only two days, and neither her nor Harvey have anything pressing, that perhaps it would be a kind gesture to let Robert have two days as the Boss, without an interruption.

She stands with presence, knocking on the glass frame of the man's office.

She's seen many people take centre stage here. _Hardman. Jessica. Harvey._ All with their own agendas and their own style and their own individual presence. Robert's not had much time to furnish the space, but he's much more low key than either Harvey or Jessica had been. Harvey always had that rare vintage quality to his offices, adding a warmth and a depth to him that helped people understand his harshness, and Jessica, a keenly feminine and delicate application, to offset her occasional hardness and praying mantis quality to her personal space; a kind of warm entry morphed into a _dare all who enter_ feeling for those who came calling; more often than not, demanding things for their own personal gain.

She spies a picture of his wife and Rachel, and a basketball or two.

"Donna." He greets, that ripple of caramel and chocolate and morello cherry colour to his rich voice. "To what do I owe this visit?" He asks.

"I have a favour to ask." She introduces. "And...It's a big one." She adds.

" _Bigger than taking over your firm_?" He half-jokes. "You don't shy away from bold requests at the this firm, do you?" He regards, a twinkle in his eyes.

"It's something that won't harm you...but also won't give you much of a financial return." She explains.

He smiles then. She's able to talk on a knife edge - whether she's channelling her inner Jessica until her own confidences solidify, or playing what she knows of the man.

Either way it works, and he's smiling at her with a knowing look.

"Alright. What is it?" He says, that slow drawl to his voice.

"Harvey and I...haven't had much vacation time over the past... _forever_...and we would both like...to ask for tomorrow and Thursday off."

"Okay." He says, looking at her with an acuteness then. "You and Harvey, are?"

"Robert,"

" _Haven't you heard about our inter-office policies_?" He jokes, sarcasm lacing his words. As if he's to judge, with is daughter now ensconced in a life with their ex-coworker slash convict slash golden boy. "I believe they frown on that kind of thing. Especially within management."

Her gaze sharpens then, unfazed by the insinuation. "I think you knew about our rather colourful reputation before you came here, and even above that, know that _I_ operate with more than the usual amount of professionalism." She notes.

"It's not _you_ I'm worried about," He remarks with a devilish smile, sitting back in his chair with a slight swing to it.

"We would like to go and visit your daughter and Mike." She explains, stepping clean over his insinuation.

"Oh...so you're leaving me to clean house, whilst Harvey hops cities to see my son-in-law?"

"You know those two... _are brothers from another Mother_." She reminds him, with a knowing smile.

"I hear that." He says, groaning at the fact.

"And of course, it's been weeks since I saw Rachel. And...we used to have lunch _every week_ without fail." She adds, allowing the feeling to peel out of her voice. "Look, Robert, I understand it's an ask...but we don't ask for much when it comes to our personal lives. We could both do with a little vacation before everything settles, and before Harvey starts back full time with his client base." She explains. "And I'll be on call for anything you need. I'm taking my laptop, so I'll be still connected." She adds. "And of course, Louis's Assistant Gretchen is more than capable of helping out with anything that you need. She was Harvey's assistant for a time, so she knows the inner workings of the firm."

She watches as he takes his time, mulling over her request in his mind.

Robert Zane is a man of words, but careful ones. He doesn't shoot the shit unless Harvey's in the room, and much like her, he treats everyone with a different quality.

She stands there, not batting an eyelid in the face of his decision.

"Alright.." He sighs. "Say hi to my baby girl for me." He requests, a fatherly heaviness drawing out of him. "And take some pictures of her place." He orders with a look.

"You'll even get a video." She lavishes. "Thank you, Robert." She says, sauntering out of his office with her head held high.

"And Donna?" She hears him call.

"Yes?" She asks, turning.

"It's some flight to Seattle. _Five hours_...even in Business class." He says pointedly. "I'd take an extra day I if I were you." He adds with a smirk.

"I'll...take that under advisement." She says carefully.

" _Wouldn't want Harvey without his beauty sleep_." He quips.

She chuckles then, covering any answer that he may be looking for.

 ** _She hasn't woken up with Harvey enough times to know what he's like to wake up to after a restless night..._**

. …

 _Hey boy, I like your style_

 _Come over here, let's talk awhile_

 _Yeah you, I'm curious_

 _What we'd do, the two of us_

 _What would you like to do?_

 _I'll introduce you to_

 _My eyes, my lips, my hair_

 _If you're good we'll go from there_

 _I'm feeling you_

 _And I know that you want me too_

 _In the end, I'm doing me_

 _That's all you got to see_

 _Hey, that's just how it is_

 _But I gotta tell you this_

 _I'm a bit too dangerous_

 _If you want me you should just…_

 _Treat me like fire._

' _Treat me like fire' By Lion Babe_

. . .

As she walks down to the lobby of her building, lining up with the third stroke of seven, her small suitcase wheeling along behind her, she spots the sleek black town car flanking the sidewalk. _It won't be Ray at this time of night_ , she thinks to herself. A nervousness catches in her chest when the door opens, and Harvey unfolds onto the sidewalk, suddenly out of his armour of sorts, his usual suited form discarded in place of a grey sweater and charcoal slacks.

She smiles, as he takes her suitcase.

"So... _this_ is casual Harvey," She jokes.

"Look who's talking." He counters, observing her casual dress as he pops the boot of the car, lifting the case to fit beside his own.

She smiles to herself, feeling at odds with the attention when he gestures for her to get into the car.

 _What_ _ **are**_ _they doing?_ She thinks to herself as she slides onto the seat, as he appears on the other side.

 _Running away together across the full expanse of the country…to Seattle...and for what?_

Sure, their friends are there. But they've been there for a couple of weeks now. And it doesn't take a genius to work out that they _both_ miss their friends and past coworkers both individually and together. Mike and Rachel were…. _are_...their immediate family, both of their counterparts and their strange parallel and..losing them to another city has been a rare kind of blow to both of them.

"Harvey?" She says, rousing his silence. "Have you told them that we're coming?" She asks.

"Yeah. I text Mike. He made reservations for dinner tomorrow."

"Meaning that Rachel made reservations." She pieces together with a smile.

"Exactly." He smiles back.

She chuckles to herself, feeling on edge for the silliest reasons.

This is Harvey. A man she's spent her life with.

"And what time is our flight?" She enquires.

He eyes her then, aware of the change in himself.

 _It's he who's making reservations. Planning their excursion. Him. Not her._

"We'll make it, don't worry." He tells her, smirking confidently as he lets a breath settle from his chest.

"I'm not _worried_ …" She replies, a false confidence about her. "Just...curious." She clarifies.

" _I got it covered_ ," He assures her. "We set off at eight." He divulges. "Set down at 1am."

She struggles to miss that little sparkle in his tired eyes. The way he flexes his jaw in thought, his hand tapping on the edge of the window frame as the car moves gently in the mid-week evening traffic.

"And where, _pray tell_ , will we be checking in?" She asks.

"You'll see." He smirks to her, then to himself. as only his eyes glance out at the window.

 _How has he planned this...all? In such a short space of time?_

She turns her head to the front, seeing the blur of yellow cabs dance around them like fireflies caught in a funnel.

It occurs to her then. And only then.

"Harvey...is this a... _date_?" She asks, a boldness framing her rather confused tone.

"Everything with you is a date." He throws at her, his tone ambiguous.

" _What's that supposed to mean_?" She snorts, turning to him, the insinuation on her face for him elaborate further, and to be quick with it.

His chin lowers, his dark eyes regarding her interest. " _It means_...that you're a woman of occasion."

"Umm...Could you use english please?" She remarks.

He chuckles at her obtuseness. _She's not stupid, she just likes to make him work for it on those rare occasions that he doesn't say exactly what he means to._

"I mean, _Dumbo_...that you like things to be done properly." He reasons. "And so...this is _me_... _doing things properly_."

It's his explanation that settles her need to question his use of the word 'Dumbo'...

"We've been naked, in my bed with aerated cream in a can, Harvey. _The jig is up_." She notes, smiling wryly.

He looks to her then, exuding confidence and charisma and something so solid in his core that she feels that he might actually break her if dared to try.

"If I'd have realised, back then, exactly _how much_ you mean to me…" His eyes disconnect then. She senses him bend to the whim of his own self consciousness. It's feint, but it's there. "I might...have done things a little differently before now," He says, finally.

 _This is a lot._ This Harvey is a different one, and all at once she's as nervous as if they were two young kids, going to prom.

She has her reservations, images of babies with blonde hair that aren't hers and complications that end in disaster.

But she nods. Because essentially she understands.

If she realised how hard he was to shake, she wouldn't have blocked the idea of them out of her mind for as long as she has. _Out of his mind._ She wouldn't have taken it off the table, at any case.

She sidles slowly along the backseat, nearing his seated form until their thighs brush, her flowing cotton against his cords. She reigns in a breath, sliding her arm under his, looping it around his elbow, before placing her head gently on his jacket laden shoulder, allowing his arm to settle loosely around her waist. The smell of him transports her back to his office, and the days of laying on his couch, covered in papers and suspending a carton of shitty tasting take out in mid air. Her eyes drift closed for a moment, evoking her other senses, and after a moment or two she feels his lips against her hair, kissing the side of her head, before his cheek falls against the spot.

It's there, on the Queensborough Bridge, on their way to the airport, where they first learn to be intimate. To be close and to be just them.

 _No titles. No work. No constraints._

It's simple and it seems to exceed even her lofty expectations.

It's then, that she finally learns to let go, and allow him to simply hold her.

And he learns, that she _might_ have lied about her feelings before.

. ….

Please feed the kitty!


End file.
